My Father Goes to Court

Carlo Bulosan

Point of view: 1st person

Setting: 1918
Summary
o When the persona was 4 years old, his/her family moved to the town because their farm was flooded.
o They lived with a rich neighbour whose servants always cooked good delicious food. They can smell the
aroma of the dishes through the windows of the house.
o The doors and windows of the neighbours house were always shut and the children were not allowed
to play.
o The persona together with his/her siblings grew healthy and happy while they were allowed to play
outside, under the sun. And they continued to savour the delicious smell from the neighbours.
o As they grew healthier, they started to hear their neighbours getting sick, coughing day and night. First,
the parents then, the children.
o One day, the personas family received a complaint from their neighbour who grew sicklier each day,
while they, the opposite.
o The day of the court trial, their father represented themselves.
o Trial:
It was said by the neighbours lawyer that they stole the spirits of their neighbour from all the
smelling of the food.
The father asked the neighbour if they think they stole their spirits. The neighbour said yes.
So the father said they will pay them. He gathered money from his pockets and from his
children. And walked with the straw hat containing the money to the other end of the room.
He then said, now they have paid them through giving the spirit of the money to them.
Then, the neighbour fell to the ground. Father went to his aid
o The judge said that his uncle died laughing. So the father said, do you want to hear my family laugh? The
whole crowd laughed along with the family.

My Own Theory of Devolution

Jessica Zafra

Point of view: 1st person

Devolution: the more you drink, the lower you become
Stages of Devolution:
o APE vision blurs, nauseous, starting to slouch, arms down like an ape
o REPTILE non-functional legs, crawl to travel to another part of the room
o POLITICIAN talkative, loud voice, reveal secrets to strangers, then become pompous, and stop making
sense, obnoxious
o FISH (or Sammy the Sperm) not attempting to crawl anymore, swim on the floor
o ROCK pass out, lose consciousness, not an organism anymore, lowest on the evolutionary ladder
Next morning: start of evolution again
Resolutions to never drink again and not keep: human again
Lola Isyang at ang Matandang Puno ng Kaimito
Chary Lou Navarro-Defante

Point of view: 3rd person

The poem talks about Lola Isyang who was looking at an old kaimito tree from her window. The breeze gently
removed the leaves of the tree. She then felt the same breeze in her eyes so she closed the window and lied on
her bed. She finally felt the impact of breeze as it forced her eyes to close like how the breeze removed the
leaves from the old kaimito tree.
Personification of the breeze
The removal of the leaves of the old kaimito tree can represent Lola Isyang as she reached her own death.

Ghost
Connie Jan Maranan

Point of view: 1st person

Summary:
o The persona was a development worker and a daily commuter in the bustling city of Manila. One day, as
she purchased a statue of the Nazarene, blocks of concrete slabs came crashing down along with the
LRT station above.
o She discovered she was a ghost by fleeting back and forth across the Superhighway and allowing the
speeding vehicles to pass through her, through the absence of her senses.
o Afterwards, she thought of her earthly life. How much she regretted not settling her business with her
lover, her memories of him and how they were together.
o She then claimed that she saw our Creator and He is not as fatherly as most of us thought to be. She
described Him as having an androgynous appearance with an angelic face that is both beautiful and
handsome, as well as having wisdom and wit that contradicts his appearance.
o She remembered more of the memories she had before like her first train ride, her first visit to
Tayuman, her activist life with her lover and how they were not found out. She started missing her
senses, as there was no more human sensations where she was. She was still getting used to not having
them and to the fact that there was no more need for language. Such were times when she sees the
faces of joy; she knew she lived through them, but knowing that she did was different from actually
feeling it.
o She then drifted on about how she fell in love and how she must have been remembered by someone
and how by remembering her, she somehow became alive, though only in memory.
o She then waited, in darkness, for someone to remember her, for who she once was. So that she may
take on the shape of a memory and once more, even though its just an instance, feel that she is alive.