Hope Not Abandoned

Kundi Akala (High Chair, 2004) is the fifth and latest poetry book of Allan Popa. His previous ones are Hunos, Morpo, Samsara, and Kami sa Lahat ng Masama, and these titles reveal a distinguishing trait: Popa’s collected poems constitute a complete cycle. While the poems can stand individual scrutiny outside the context of the collection to which they belong, clearly Popa prefers writing poems that manifest their constituency to the entire collection. Some of these poems were first published individually, rich and potent by themselves, but are now taken together with the rest of Kundi Akala to demonstrate a clear and deliberate adherence to a single yet complex trajectory.  

‘Desired Descent’  

“To come down by a movement in which gravity plays no part,” serves as epigraph of Kundi Akala. The line, from philosopher Simone Weil, is key to reading the collection. It suggests that the poems in the book desire a keen descent or a coming down—to what, we do not know, but it is not imperative to know anyway—stripped of the motion’s impelling need or its requisite. It is as though an absolute decision—steered by nothing but perhaps wisdom or enigma—is already in the hands of Popa’s first person speaker, his “I.” (Speaking in the first person point of view is a deliberate shift taken by Popa, who uses the third person point of view in his previous collection Kami sa Lahat ng Masama. This shift always makes for a more focused and fresher look on his subjects.) While what this descent is for is not relevant, the desire to perform the desired act (descent) without anything to prompt or compel the actor to do it is. To succeed in this desire is likewise unimportant; what is important is this desire itself being discoursed in and through the poems.        

In this ‘desired descent’ not affected/effected by gravity, one may observe how Popa essentially challenges even as he sustains in his new book his previous books’ projects. In Kami sa Lahat ng Masama, gravity, even if not the central discourse, is given great thought by Popa. Gravity that has force over all things on earth and has therefore connection to everything we do. In the beginning of Kami, for instance, Popa says: “Narito ang puso ng grabedad” (Mula sa Kailaliman). In Morpo he goes on: “Habang patuloy ang hatak ng grabedad / sa haba ng abang—” (Skylab) and “sa labí ng lahat ng pag-asa. // (grabedad)” (Ang Infiernong Nabubucsan)—and it is, it can be surmised, in the latter where Kundi Akala takes off. Listen to how it resonates in the first line of the opening poem in Kundi Akala, “Simula”:  

Nilisan ako ng lahat ng pag-asa ngunit nanatili ako.  

Indeed, the beginning.

I hazard to use “Simula” as representative poem of the book though it might not be in the heart of the collection. Also, may I add that no poem from among Popa’s books serves only as filler. Always each poem is part of the overall design and structure and the opening poem sets the course of the succeeding ones. I also take liberty to say that “Simula” is indeed a metaphor for the beginning of the book, hence the title (ironic, given that Popa almost completely abandons the use of metaphors in the poems—in “Pahina,” he says plainly, “Una kong itinapon palabas ang mga talinghaga.”).  

Furthermore “Simula” illustrates the book’s objective. For example, to be able to begin the ‘descent,’ Popa must make certain his persona’s (which is also the persona of the whole collection) state, albeit without naming or identifying the persona other than telling readers that all it is is “nalabíng katawan at isipang pugad ng mga salita.” Only from ascertaining this state can the logic and reason of the poems spring thus. Which is why in as early as in the first poem, Popa declares what might be the thesis (Nilisan ako ng lahat ng pag-asa) and antithesis (ngunit nanatili ako) of the collection; and from there it can fairly be supposed that the synthesis will be the arc of the book. That Popa eloquently fuses such oppositions in just one line, in a language unadorned, is to experience very fine poetry. 

‘Abandon hope…’

“Nilisan ako ng lahat ng pag-asa” sums up, albeit in negation, all the possible experiences of the persona—experiences that, when read in their enormity, can easily overcome the persona if not for “ngunit nanatili ako.” We know the difference it makes; for how grave is it to lose hope while life still clings to one? Is Popa’s speaker then already dead? Maybe a spirit or soul?  Is the persona likened to Virgil who speaks to Dante, “No man am I, though once / A man I was—” as we also recall from both “labí ng lahat ng pag-asa” and “Nilisan ako ng lahat ng pag-asa” the admonition “Abandon hope, all ye who enter here” in Canto 3 of the Inferno? Does the persona come from hell? Possibly.  Nevertheless, this persona is neither the soul nor spirit, nor as with Dante, “spectre from the shades.” Because here, the persona is left with “katawan / at isipang pugad ng mga salita.” If I may further suppose: it is not that the persona is the soul or the spirit, but that the persona possesses no soul from the start. (Popa will probe on the soul’s creation in “Kung Paano Nalilikha ang Kaluluwa.”) It merits an inquiry into why the persona should own no soul, i.e., soul in the Judeo-Christian belief. Because the soul, believed to reap in the afterlife the consequences of its corporeal acts, thus carries more weight. Reason tells us that, somehow, to ‘descend by a movement free from gravity,’ the persona must be incorporeal.  

Is not Popa’s speaker pure energy then, pure consciousness or intellect? The Intellect that Keats differentiates from the Soul in his “Soul-making”? The possibilities remain. Popa’s speaker may also be taken as Orpheus who always looks back to witness the dissolution of the beloved (muli’t muling lumilingon upang saksihan ang pagkagunaw ng inibig).  This may explain why the speaker is in the ruins (guho), that is, for an Orphic speaker, a place for Song (lunan ng bawat pag-awit). And if we plainly and simply construe ‘hope’ to equal ‘beloved,’ then it may make sense too why the persona, ostensibly, has lost hope (nilisan ng pag-asang nakiraan lamang sa katawan)—because it has lost the beloved. However Popa’s persona remains resolute, undaunted (hanggang mawalan ng loob), and ardent; saying “nananatili siya” at “maisusulat niya ito” —whatever takes place the persona can, and will, write about them. Because to write about them is not to abandon hope. This conviction, I think, represents the astonishing push and pull, the big paradox, of Kundi Akala: the seeming inevitable retreat of the persona to despair apparent on the surface may prove in the end (i.e., at the end of our reading the collection) as a triumph of will.