PASIG

The spirits no longer bathe here, though in moonlight, my eyes trick me sometimes, and I think it is the weeping tree I see, seducing dream-filled dissidents. Their young bloated bodies sleep in the riverbed and greet me as they surface.

 

Tell me, why would the diwata visit this dead, filthy place, to make a home among its broken things, to drink its filthy water, to breathe its acrid air?

 

No, there is no more reason for her to return. We may as well fill it with mud and forget, for there is nothing but wordless burial here. And no one who will say grace.