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ALBERT B. CASUGA, a Philippine-born writer, lives in Mississauga, Ontario, Canada, where he continues to write poetry, fiction, and criticism after his retirement from teaching and serving as an elected member of his region's school board. He was nominated to the Mississauga Arts Council Literary Awards in 2007. A graduate of the Royal and Pontifical University of St. Thomas (now University of Santo Tomas, Manila. Literature and English, magna cum laude), he taught English and Literature (Criticism, Theory, and Creative Writing) at the Philippines' De La Salle University and San Beda College. He has authored books of poetry, short stories, literary theory and criticism. He has won awards for his works in Canada, the U.S.A., and the Philippines. His latest work, A Theory of Echoes and Other Poems was published February 2009 by the University of Santo Tomas Publishing House. His fiction and poetry were published by online literary journals Asia Writes and Coastal Poems recently. He was a Fellow at the 1972 Silliman University Writers Workshop, Philippines. As a journalist, he worked with the United Press International and wrote an art column for the defunct Philippines Herald.

Friday, April 19, 2013

THE BIG QUESTIONS, 19: DISCARDED DAYS (ARE OUR LIVES MADE OF DISCARDED DAYS? IS THIS OUR BEST SHOT AT STAYING ALIVE?)

This is Poem #19 in my series of poem-responses to Life's Big Questions as posed by Simon Blackburn in his The Big Questions, Philosophy. Prof. Blackburn teaches at the University of Cambridge in England.
 
 
What does it mean to stay alive? Why stay alive, when dying is easier?
 
 
 
 
DISCARDED DAYS

What have we discarded, cutting through tunnels
we must have plodded, to quarry from lives we
might have been accidentally given? What loves
have we found, what hearts have we lost? Layers
of clay, cracked stones, and silt could build us our
houses of hurts and ruptured dreams. Not a home.

But we take care to wake up to days we can shape,
to moments we could mould like delicate bowls
whence we share victual and drink for our hungry
and thirsty souls. When travel becomes a burden
of faithlessness or pain, we call each other out:
Be brave, hold on, take on the world if we must!

When these passageways fall dark, we walk on.
After all, our lives are not made of discarded days.

---ALBERT B. CASUGA


This poem was inspired by  a poem written by Norfolk VA poet Luisa A. Igloria. "Time teaches a lighter tread: or/the body bound to gravity must shed/layer after layer. What progress is tracked, /comes only in the manner of what’s discarded: "---From “The Road of Imperfect Attentions” by Luisa A. Igloria, Via Negativa. 07-30-11

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