I have come of age to vote,
Yet missed the day to register.
I have come of age to be wise,
Yet missed the day to remember.

I love my country dearly,
I live in it and am bound to it!
Yet a finger I couldn’t raise,
To those who deserve disgrace!

If not for my wicked heart,
Struck by apathy and antipathy,
I would have remembered,
The cries of my own country.

I lament the fact that I’m AWOL,
During the day of difference.
What can I do to redeem myself?
If my heart knows not itself?

My heart and head stand neutral!
With right or wrong just equal!
And there is no greater evil than me,
Who watches hearts bleed out.

There is no greater evil than I,
That see blue, red, yellow, and white,
Become pure in their sad colors.
A non-voter who laments to himself!

Become pure blue due to suffocation.
Become pure red due to old wounds.
Become pure yellow due to disease.
Become pure white as death visits.

Oh, dear Philippines my motherland.
I see, speak, and do evil on your body.
I ask the Lord for forgiveness and grace,
As the church rot from inside the gates.

My love for you is conditional!
I was born in your womb, motherland!
I serve you as I live on shame!
Yet my heart is grasped by ignorance!

Let my coming of age speak,
Let youth cry out in agony.
As I wait for my next chance,
To rid myself of this apathy.

Let my Absence teach you what my presence did not
Let my laments teach you what my songs did not
Let my disloyalty teach you what my sincerity did not

gently beckon
the sweet words with
slivertongue fingers
slowly, steady
'til all is ready

placate them with lemonade
and roses for the sweetly grave
snipped especial so to save
their souls' decay
as it were
in olden day

gaily affair we
singing high and merr'ly
and twirl as tiny fairies
do in mid-summer eves

sprinkled loves
and lists
of hopes and kisses
and corpse-like tenderness
it sickens

so do the sweet words sour
and I alone this hour
do turn the tables paleweak
and weep them
so they sink
into my nothing
I keep
oh so dearly

how sincerely
I do try
to **** them softly
and dry the eyes
of mourners
far and wide
but alas
they always die

the end is my domain