Enduring and Intriguing: Glass of Liquid Truths
'He penetrates into the heart of the matter. The cloistered existence has helped him re-order his thoughts.
The din and confusion and the daily struggle of survival are faint memories
when one seeks refuge within the four walls of the monastery.'
The din and confusion and the daily struggle of survival are faint memories
when one seeks refuge within the four walls of the monastery.'
By Cornelio Panes
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The academic year 1979-1980 in the Philippines is very significant if only because the University of San Agustin wears diamond. Panay, one must concede, is an Augustinian country. Fray Martin de Rada, "the Apostle of Panay", was an Augustinian. All historic churches that now form part of our religious and artistic heritage were built by the first missionaries to set foot on these shores.
Glass of Liquid Truths is every Panayanon's answer to the prophet of doom's allegation that poetry is dying, if not yet dead, in the Philippines. Fray Gilbert Luis R. Centina is an Augustinian. There is some grain of truth in the joke that we should give back our country to the Augustinians. At least, in poetry. For Fray Centina's brand of poetry can help rejuvenate the Filipino psyche. His poems brim with earthiness. Fray Centina is not only a high priest of Philippine Poetry; he is also the Jeremiah of our angst. —The Publisher |
The third, international deluxe edition of a Palanca prize-winning collection of poems Glass of Liquid Truths by poet Fray Gilbert Luis R. Centina III should not be judged merely by its contents. In the history of Philippine publishing, it has scored two "firsts" which literary historians now and in the immediate future cannot simply ignore; first, it is the first book in the Philippines to make use of photograms and second, it is the first poetry book to be ever launched in Western Visayas.
Enduring and intriguing, the book—since its first publication—has withstood the test of time and the many. Some of the poems therein have been included in various Philippine contemporary literary textbooks in the country. The inclusion of the poem "Elegy", however, in a high school textbook in communication arts may be both a boon and a bane. A boon, because it disproves some misconceptions regarding the poet's orthodoxy; a bane, because, for some who precisely go for the poet's so-called "heterodoxy", this inclusion can mean betrayal of one's persuasions. |
But whether Centina is orthodox or unorthodox is now an academic question good for critics who waste their time determining how many angels can dance on top of spaghetti. The real concern is this: does Centina deserve the closing remarks as Nick Joaquin deserves the opening remarks in a textbook edited by Visitación de la Torre?
In Europe, the Augustinians have established themselves as men of letters. Martin Luther, for instance, was an Augustinian before he fathered the German language. Fray Luis de León, "prince of Spanish lyric poetry", was an Augustinian and remained so until he wrote thirty. How about in the Philippines? Trailblazer Urdaneta lived a life of poetry, complete with rhyme schemes. But so far no biographer has yet discovered that he wrote poems. Isacio Rodriguez, Luis Merino, Gaspar San Agustin—they will always belong to the illustrious roster of historians. In the Philippines, the Augustinians have had always occupied the cathedra of history. Centina, then, is a freak, simply because he writes poems when he should be engrossed in dates. |
Opposite: Cover illustration of the third edition of Glass of Liquid Truths. Above, cover of the fourth edition of the poetry collection when it was published for the first time in the United States in 2013.
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The book is impressive: glass rhymes with class. The truths are liquid and yet they are solid facts. Somehow, they evoke sensuality, earthiness, mortality. One wonders what really answers to the descriptions "viscous, circumstantial, unrehearsed". The imageries conjures visions and conjectures. To Freudian versifiers like Federico Licsi Espino Jr., they are phallic illusions and allusions.
The poet speaks of "joss stick" and "maculate conception" and "pregnant hour", but he does not fail to recite his "compline". He remembers a kind of "boyhood under question", and this is vindicated by "late dirge for grandmother". "Quick-silver tears" belong to "saints and miracles", which may partly explain why his "advice to a young poet" sounds, pardon the poetizing, "ethereal".
Centina is one of the very few poets in the Philippines who can go back to the theme of childhood without sounding melodramatic. "Knighthood" is a rite of passage, a prelude to encounters with girls who are "lush and luscious". The threnody of "Gerard taking the habit" bars witches from coming in. It is time to separate the chaff from the grain during the card reading sessions. "The worms, the worms...where are the trees?" "Walking cadavers" are defrocked by their own "spatial inanities".
The temptation is too great to take Centina as a poet of thoughts, which is terribly unfair for one who excels in poetic form. He does not even need the crutches of rhymes; his interior rhythm is all too deafening. A macabre sense of humor outgrows a graceful portrait; this is no work of one graceless child!
It has become a fashion for him to confront death. And in death, life. There are shadows, a season called doubt. And yet the boy in him finds heaven "a basketball away". The manner of seeing and saying triumphs over gilt nihilities. The poet is so human, one special reason he is a poet of faith.
Glass of Liquid Truths in its third, international deluxe edition, in a sense, is a re-affirmation of Centina's position as the "foremost Filipino poet in the cassock today". In finality of it all, it is the printed word that pursues the habit of survival.
The poet speaks of "joss stick" and "maculate conception" and "pregnant hour", but he does not fail to recite his "compline". He remembers a kind of "boyhood under question", and this is vindicated by "late dirge for grandmother". "Quick-silver tears" belong to "saints and miracles", which may partly explain why his "advice to a young poet" sounds, pardon the poetizing, "ethereal".
Centina is one of the very few poets in the Philippines who can go back to the theme of childhood without sounding melodramatic. "Knighthood" is a rite of passage, a prelude to encounters with girls who are "lush and luscious". The threnody of "Gerard taking the habit" bars witches from coming in. It is time to separate the chaff from the grain during the card reading sessions. "The worms, the worms...where are the trees?" "Walking cadavers" are defrocked by their own "spatial inanities".
The temptation is too great to take Centina as a poet of thoughts, which is terribly unfair for one who excels in poetic form. He does not even need the crutches of rhymes; his interior rhythm is all too deafening. A macabre sense of humor outgrows a graceful portrait; this is no work of one graceless child!
It has become a fashion for him to confront death. And in death, life. There are shadows, a season called doubt. And yet the boy in him finds heaven "a basketball away". The manner of seeing and saying triumphs over gilt nihilities. The poet is so human, one special reason he is a poet of faith.
Glass of Liquid Truths in its third, international deluxe edition, in a sense, is a re-affirmation of Centina's position as the "foremost Filipino poet in the cassock today". In finality of it all, it is the printed word that pursues the habit of survival.
