2021

What Comes Next

Almost a year has passed now since we started living this life in pandemic limbo. “Unprecedented” is a word that has been thrown around, just as metaphors comparing the virus to a war waged by an invisible enemy have become ubiquitous. Through language, we are conditioned to think of militarism as positive and necessary in combating this crisis—unconsciously consenting to draconian security measures because they are done under the name of public health. Not only is the war metaphor dangerous and wrong, it also reduces the complexity of the problem into something as simplistic as ‘beating the virus’, without first examining the systems in place that allow its proliferation and the catastrophic impact it brought along. The only thing this pandemic has in common with war is what it has in common with other collective crises: it exposed all the ugliness and inequality of the society which we participate in.

Definitely, there are other metaphors. And while they might seem lacking or imperfect, too, they can help us rethink this crisis. In Arundhati Roy’s provocative essay, she likens the pandemic to a portal:

Taglunod, Tagsunog

Erika Carreon February 12, 2021

The First Arcology

When they had begun building the arcology it didn’t have a name. Many had not heard the word before, did not know the origins, and their minds fashioned an Ark of incredible size. It was beyond language and therefore beyond imagination.

They were the dreamers with means. They wanted to dream their way out of the impending doom that came with the floods that always every year seemed to grow higher and higher, scorning every tired, inadequate effort to tame them. They had cast their dreaming eye upon the dark, clogged rivers and the worn cement of sinking cities, saw the cobbled houses on stilts with their patchwork roofs that lined the waterways and sewers and said We will make for them a new kind of city to unburden the old. When they closed their dreaming eyes they saw the arcology, able to feed itself and power itself, an organism not unlike a tree, needing nothing else but good land and the cooperation of all its parts, ready to survive into the new age.

The Ticket

Rochelle Ann Molina February 12, 2021

“Boys grow up to be men. And it’s men who cause all the trouble. They’re the ones who shed the blood and poison the earth.” – Stephen King, Sleeping Beauties

ONE SUNDAY MORNING, the world woke up without women. No man really knew what happened. Were they abducted by aliens? Were they all kidnapped by a mogul? A male news anchor on TV screamed, “We’re happy the transgenders and intersex who are biological glitches are gone but where the hell did our wives go?” News on the Internet kept announcing reward money from Caucasian men for any one with leads as to where their wives and children have gone. Even the male presidents and prime ministers did not know where their wives went or where they have taken their children. One Sunday morning, the world woke up without women. Of course, wherever the women go, the children go with them.

As to Rolando Magsaysay, a Filipino with a sound mind and body at age of 35 years old, his world suddenly become at a standstill. He woke up expecting her wife and children at the dining table waiting for him to join their breakfast. Instead, he found the house empty. There was no laughter and heavy steps from their seven-year old daughter Charo and his three- year old son Gabrielle. There was no kitchen smelling like pancakes and coffee. There was no one but him.

Walang Susing Musoleyo

John Paul Albiola February 12, 2021

Nilalampaso ni Titser Jane ang sahig ng musoleyong putikan dahil sa pag-ulan kagabi. Ginawa nila itong panandalian na silid-aralan para sa mga batang nakatira rito sa sementeryo ng Brgy. Mayapis. At hindi sila ngayon makapagklase dahil sa kapal ng putik na pumasok sa loob nito.

Kasalukuyan siya na tinutulungang maglinis ng mga bata na kaniyang tinuturuan. Nilapitan siya ni Chelsa na tila balisa.

“Titser Jane sabi po ni Loloy na sabi raw po ng Mama niya kapag namatay raw po ang tao nagiging lupa ‘pag matagal nang nakalibing. Tinatakot niya po kami Titser Jane,” sumbong nito habang pinipilit na hindi maiyak.

Quaranfic

Gabriela Baron February 12, 2021

Tondo 1

“Nay pwede na lumabas?!” Napabalikwas sa higaan si Jeng-jeng nang makarinig ng mga naghuhuntahan at naglalarong bata.

“Oo, ikaw na lumabas para bumili ng ulam at marami pa kong isasampay. Yung kapatid mo papasukin mo na rin dito!”

Agarang tumayo si Jeng-jeng at kinuha ang barya mula sa ina.

What Comes Next

Taglunod, Tagsunog

The Ticket

Walang Susing Musoleyo

Quaranfic

You Missed

Katitikan Issue 6: Lives of an Anxious Milieu

ISANG ARAW SA LABAS NG BAHAY AT IBA PANG SHITS

Lugdas

On “Te, tabangi ko bi”