Three Poems by Raul G. Moldez

 

WHEN HE GETS BORED

 

he goes out of the house,

catching hermit crabs

 

at the back of a makeshift toilet

by the shore. Putting them,

 

one by one, inside an empty

Milkmaid can. He can hear them

 

moving. Keep on crawling.

Perhaps looking for a way

 

out. But each time they take steps

upward, they fall back. Fighting

 

for freedom or seeking for justice

is not easy. It may even cost life.

 

At noon, he would start crushing

their shells using stones as anvil

 

and hammer, killing all of them.

The crushed meat is collected

 

in a coconut shell. Used as bait

in the hook. And as the sun turns itself

 

into lemon in the west, he would cast

his fishing line into the waters.

 

 

LIFE

 

is a line

linking years. And

in between, these

minor lines exist:

 

A line that brings

power to the house.

 

A line that carries

water to the sink.

 

A line that gives

breaking news.

 

A line that allows you

to hear your sweetheart

 

from afar.

Lines that help

 

fortune tellers

predict the future.

 

Lines that are written

on the forehead by time.

 

 

 

THE MINORITY REPORT

contains details not made public

by those who do not know

the meaning of guilt. Truth hurts.

 

That’s why they bury it in the bundles

of documents tied with red ribbon.

And kept in the stockroom for decades.

 

But truth cannot be hidden, according

to the most sacred among the books.

Freedom is its new synonym.

 

The hands of justice and the arms

of law are long. Enough to dig out

dungeons where truths are buried alive

 

by lovers of deceits and deceptions. 

In the meantime, they celebrate.

Red Wine. Whisky. Double Black.

 

But to everything there is a season.

The minority bloc is not sleeping.

Working until wee hours. Seeking

 

for the most striking of evidences.

True to all is true to some. And

no matter what, truth is always true.

Raul G. Moldez writes from Cagayan de Oro City, Philippines. Author of two collections of poetry, A Day in a Poet’s Life and Other Poems and Mga Taho Gikan sa Akong Uniberso, his works have appeared in Philippines Free Press, Philippines Graphic, Philippine Panorama, Sunday Times Magazine, Crowns and Oranges, Kinaadman Journal, Bisaya, Sunstar Weekend, Homelife, Ani Literary Journal, Bituon, Dagmay, Tinubdan, Red River Review, and Sentinel Literary Quarterly, among other publications.