Soliloquy as poetry

On view recently at the GSIS Museum along Roxas Blvd. in Pasay was the exhibit Poetry as Soliloquy, the 8’x44’ mural by the late painter and poet Maningning Miclat, whose third year anniversary of her passing was observed last Sept. 29. Included in the exhibit are several prizewinning poems from the first Maningning Miclat poetry awards, the authors of which read their poems on opening night.

The mural "Soliloquy" itself was first exhibited at the CCP in 1994, and later reshown at the same venue after her death in April 2001, on the occasion of what would have been the artist’s 29th birthday. During the Poetry as Soliloquy launch, the Maningning Miclat prize for painting 2004 was also declared open to artists, painters and illustrators. The poetry and painting awards are to be given on alternate years, the poetry winners on odd-numbered years and the painters on even-numbered years. All contestants should not be more than 28 years old, Maningning’s age at the time of her passing.

Unfortunately we were unable to make it to GSIS last Sept. 4, while in far off Bohol another old friend was about to breathe his last due to liver cirrhosis. I don’t know if Clovis Nazareno ever got to know Maningning, but I do know he had everything to live for even if he might never have met her. Just as Maningning had everything to live for but for some obscure reason decided to let fall from that ledge on FEU campus on Morayta on a bleak Friday morning three years ago, and as another poet put it in tragedies of this magnitude, "she felt the blue… the leap was all."

But who are we to pass judgment on how one says goodbye?

Maningning’s mother, Alma sent me pictures of the Poetry as Soliloquy opening night, some of which may find print on these very pages depending on space constraints. There were some familiar faces in the crowd that night.

Among them Rio Alma aka National Artist Virgilio Almario, poetry mentor of Maningning at Lira (Linangan ng Imahen, Retorica at Anyo) and Ramon Magsaysay awardee Bienvenido Lumbera. Also Marj Evasco, who wrote the foreword to Maningning’s second and last book of poetry, the eerily prophetic Voice from the Underworld (Anvil 2000).

There was Ed Cabagnot, CCP film coordinator who did the cover design for Underworld, as well as Maningning’s baby sister Banaue singing a kundiman, while in the background was the death mask sculpture of the late artist done by Billy Abueva.

The poet-painter’s best friend Aba Dalena was present, too, strumming a guitar. Ditto the winners of the poetry prize, including grand prizewinners Naya Valdellon (English) and Angelito delos Reyes (Filipino), and the finalist for the Chinese division, Chen Pingsha. That Maningning wrote in three languages is well known, and puts her in the same polyglot league as Marra PL. Lanot and Federico Licsi Espino.

Maningning had written an essay for my father Francisco during the occasion of the unveiling of a mural she had done for him, entitled "Curtsey."

Maningning’s father Mario had read the essay during the wake of my father last year, and in it she recounts running into the old man at Shoppersville on Katipunan, and Franz came up to her saying, "You want to make me happy? You want to make me happy?"

What would make him happy was if Maningning did a painting for him, and so she did, and a mural at that.

The painting found its way to father’s office in 1074 Faculty Center in UP Diliman, and during a shooting of a documentary on father’s writing life he kept insisting that the painting was from Luna, meaning Sicat daughter of Roger, another friend of Maningning’s.

"No, that’s from Luna!" he insisted, though Maningning’s signature was very clearly on the lower right side panel.

When FC 1074 was evacuated after father’s death one of the last to be taken out along with the stone anito paperweight was "Curtsey," since a pickup had to be hired for it to be transported to Maginhawa Street. I believe Butch Dalisay helped in the transport of the painting, which now sits in the basement of the old house, though I have yet to check how it is coping with the elements.

During the opening of My Brother’s Moustache Muelle del Rio Joey Ayala performed what could have been the night’s most significant song, Maningning’s "Berso" set to music, the beginning stanza of which goes:

"Dumaan ako sa tahimik na ilog,/ Ang buong mundo ay parang natutulog./ Kung may bunga mang sa tubig ay mahulog,/Parang ang puso ko itong nadudurog."

Rereading portions of Voice from the Underworld, I was struck by the impressionist renderings of Maningning’s lines, much like the German poet’s Georg Trakl, although in the Filipino poet’s case understandably more oriental in approach.

I also recall my first impression when I caught an initial glimpse of "Soliloquy" in the mid-90s, which then evoked a kind of vertigo similar to when one stares down at the sea at night from a ship’s railing, the white foam leaving patterns in the blackness and void of its wake.