Our Mortal Dreams, Here They Come

(Another OFW comes home in a coffin, a news item)





In another city, a countryman dies.

A woman caregiver, the wires tell

In words circuituous and fanciful

You never see the dire days of her

Death. It is fall here as you imagine

The delayed lamentations

Of children, mother and kin,

The same scene haunting you so

In your mortal dreams. It is lifted

From Filipinas, the film and fiction,

A fact for overseas workers, this lady

Dying with her fears. She leaps

To her end, she is raped of her song,

Robbed in daylights coming in low

And late, the way the amo came in

To her with the lust of evenings

Named and unnamed. Another Filipina

Dies, another hope comes alive

Sparkling in the deep dark

Of stolen secrets, useless loves.



Aurelio S. Agcaoili

Torrance, CA

2004

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