The storm swept in from the ocean;
no one raised a lantern high in warning.
She can’t reach her sister, her daughter’s three.
Enough rain fell in a half a day for a month
flooding Manila, from rich suburbs to
the walk-up apartment where she was raised,
torrents sweeping the streets of ragged beggars.
Watching this news in Puerto Princessa
the calm stars hang on the trees of her city,
but she feels a chill in her hands:
her roofless family won’t sleep tonight.
Here in the park, long lines of lanterns
make light of the dark, children running under
the new moon. Her youngest asks, “Mummy,
why are there so little stars in the sky?” “Because
we have put them inside our lanterns, dear.”
“But Mummy, why is the sky turning red?” “
Because God is angry with someone tonight.”
“Mummy, if I light my lantern with the stars,
can all the drowning people swim to us?”
Poet Douglas Kearney and composer/producer/drummer Val Jeanty link up for a a compelling LP that feels like the written word come to life. Bandcamp New & Notable Mar 30, 2021