International Women's Day and Month (March 8, 2024): Ophelia Alcantara Dimalanta - Doyen of Philippine Poetry

 Ophelia Alcantara Dimalanta, Doyen of Philippine Poetry

In memory of Dr Ophelia Alcantara Dimalanta (1932-2010)

Requiem for a Dying Poet
By Ophelia Alcantara Dimalanta 

                         

Soon you will finally lay

To rest this poet dying

Of a broken quill for already

In the heart of the hearth

Of his mind no longer fire

But ashes flick about randomly.

For he has already been consigned

To the ignominy of little moments,

Shifting along margins of experience

Feet lagging behind senses

And senses dragged behind his will,

Ready to go.  To be puffed out

Like a guttering candle.

He is finally dying well unto his death

Panic coming easy now, afraid

To trip lest he breaks his leg.

To love lest his ligaments tear,

Deaf to sounds darkness makes

Upon an inner centering; sad that

Life has settled into a dreadful,

Cold, cold calm, a scurry of little

Needs, faceless minutiae and

Timorous appeasements and

Upheavals, like skies have become

Too timid to dip riverward and

Clouds afraid to gather into a storm,

Baring but slightly one part,

Touching but gingerly, surfing

Nets of cursory interactives, bios

Anonymous, no collision of parts

To ignite a blinding, no lines

Nor loins burning, no treads on

Grounds plundered into one

Cataclysmic shaking.

No flames charring this limp wood

Into possible deep limning.

The poet as petite is dead

Long live poetry.  ~

  

A rare photo of Dr Ofelia Dimalanta with Dr Abe V Rotor (left) who won two awards for his books, Living with Nature Series the Gintong Aklat Award, and the National book Award. At her left are Fr, Joseto N Bernades OP and Dr Armando F De Jesus, regent and former dean respectively, of the Faculty of Arts and Letters of UST

The late Dr Ophelia A . Dimalanta was all of poet, critic, academician. As poet, she published six books of poetry, namely: Montage, The Time Factor, Flowing On, Lady Polyester, Love Woman and Passional. Aside from collections of poetry, she published a book on literary criticism, The Philippine Poetica, play in two acts, Lorenzo Ruiz, Escribano, five textbooks on literature. 

She was widely anthologized not only in the Philippines but also in the United States, Russia, Germany, Taiwan, Japan, and Thailand. She won almost all literary awards in the country, and among, a lecture grant at the prestigious Modern Languages Association in Chicago, and the prominently, the SEA WRITE award given to Outstanding Southeast Asian Writers. 

She was chosen one of the one hundred outstanding women of the country, as part of the Centennial celebration. As critic, she was a founding member of the Manila Critics Circle which gives out the National Book Awards annually. Professor Dimalanta was dean of the Faculty of Arts and Letters of UST for nine years, while concurrently holding the position of Director of the UST Center for Creative Writing and Studies. Full Professorship at the UST Graduate School.

NOTE: This poem was published in Tomas, the Literary Journal of the UST Center for Creative Writing and Studies, Issue 1, Vol, 1 February 2000