NOTE: This 2-part series is my contribution to the observance of the 79th Foundation Anniversary of the Province of Catanduanes. It forms part of a research-in-progress on the Burabod poetry of Efren T. Sorra that appeared regularly in the Catanduanes Tribune from 2006 until the poet’s passing last year.
In the course of almost two decades of maintaining his Burabod poetry in the Catanduanes Tribune, Efren T. Sorra a.k.a. Etasor has composed over 700 poems. Last year, I started research on his poetry covering the first five years 2006 – 2010 which involves some 193 pieces. I realized that Burabod is a veritable chronicle of the poet’s most beloved home-province Catanduanes.
The Burabod collection is self-consciously insular Catanduanes in scope and sensibility, it never talked about anything outside it. Etasor is the insulare par excellence. So he was going to be the poetic chronicler of the island-province of his affections. This is evidenced by the fact that after explaining his poetry at the very first piece that initiated the collection, his second poem was a paean to Catanduanes titled “Catandungan Ginaha ka!” (August 2, 2006). In effect, it established the tone of the series. From 2006 – 2010, he interspersed the series with pieces on Catanduanes as a whole, twenty one (21) in all that can be divided into the natural order, the people, its history and its cultural expressions. In this article, we deal with the first two, namely the place and the people.
The place
In its most basic and essential, what defines Catanduanes is its physical geographic features, its being a ruggedly hewn island. It is exposed to formidable natural challenges courtesy of the wiles of the elements that paradoxically shape its beauty. Nature is a nurturing Mother and for Catanduanes her special way of caring includes the constant occurrence of typhoons. Thus, the poem “Catandungan, Ginaha ka!” posits:
Pila nang bagyong macusog
Sa satong isla ruminampahog.
Sa kakusgan daing ibang nadangog
Hagubuhub na nakabungog.
Riput, takig…
Takot, kurugkutug…
So such trials are none but God’s way of forging the people in abiding faith to Him; the intent being to cultivate resilience and hardiness among the Catandunganons. The poem thus concludes:
Ang kibrat ning kikilat,
Ga-silyab sa hagyan ning paglaom;
Ang rinting minaparakpatak,
Minadaging ang pagtubod sa daghan.
Sa lambang payag na nauyag,
Batong harong ang minatindog;
Sa lambang abakang luminuhod,
Sobra sa pito ang minausbong.
Catandungan.. GINAHA KA!
Insularity is essentially a compelling sense of being separated from all the rest courtesy of a formidable isolating gulf that is the sea. It is a defining aspect of what is it to be a Catandungan: the ubiquity of the seas. In “Sa Punta ning Taguntong” (September 20, 2006), the Burabod poet captured the insularity of Catanduanes through three different points of view of those sailing at sea while nearing the Tagungtong Point. One, a newcomer to the island, the two others going out and returning home. While the first is a stranger that is about to experience insularity, the last two are natives who either is going on exile or coming back from it. In these last two, it is suggested that the native realizes one’s insularity by the experience of exile. For the Catandunganon, this experience is dramatically mediated by the passage through the Tagungtong.
The Tagungtong, also known as Talisoy Point, is one of two geographic points (the other one is Nagngangang Buaya) defining the southern end of Catanduanes that are like two arms that appear to embrace Cabugao Bay. From the horizon of this body of water would materialize ships and boats bringing in evidence (goods, stories) that there is a world outside of Catandduanes. It was along the shores of this bay that the major seaport of the island is located, in the capital town of Virac. This was therefore, for the longest time, the gateway of Catanduanes to the larger world out there. Particularly, sea traffic goes through the Tagungtong side towards the southwest to the direction of Tabaco, Albay and on to mainland Luzon. Taking the turn through Tagungtong in both directions takes significance as the start or end of exile. In the poem, Etasor explains such signification:
Sa kahaputan ning mga dayuhan
Kung inano ang islang Catandungan,
Ang Tagungtong mina taong kasimbagan:
Baging escarlatang ga lataw sa kadagatan.
Duman sa mga ga hareng kababanwa,
Ini igwang tugon sainda
Na saen man na lugar makapunta,
‘Di pagring’wan ang gayon ning isla.
Para sa mga ga paribud sa provincia,
Ang Tagungtong ang enot na ga cugos sainda;
Kaya, sa pag hapihap kang mga ginaha
Biyong mina uwang-uwang ang lancha.
In the last stanza, the poet intimates about the particular roughness of the sea by the Taguntong, the “uwang-uwang” of the boat due to forceful waves, which he considers as the gesture of care and embracing arms of Inang Catandungan, like the hand that rocks the cradle. It is common among Catandunganons going on a voyage to be wary of the passage through Tagungtong because of its turbulent waters. But Etasor admonishes that one should not fear it:
Ang punta ning Tagungtong
Dai dapat katakutan.
Ang piga hunang isog ning dagat;
Sa katotoohan init ning pagkamoot
Kang Inang Catandungan.
In any case, insular Catanduanes is a thing of beauty. In yet another piece on Tagungtong titled “Anong Gayon” (September 19, 2007), the beauty of the mountain formation of the Talisoy point is characterized as the sculptural work of Nature and even suggests that humans may finish the job by adding a statue of Mary the Mother of God. But the beauty of the island is also contained in the symphony of sounds produced by both nature and human life in Catanduanes. A piece published June 24, 2009 and titled “Ang Musika ning Isla” runs through the reverberations from natural phenomena (the woods, tides, the blooming of flowers, the rustle of weeds and the whispers of stars in heaven), mixing up with the humdrum of human activities. In this latter aspect, Etasor attends to the preoccupations of the ordinary folk: Laruy-laruy ning inâ (the mother’s lullabye)/Hamudyong ning para-dagat (the sound of the fisher’s conch)/Taguktok ning para-kagot (knocking of the tuba gatherer)/Supnit ning para-hag’ot (slashing of th abaca stripper)/Plauta kang bakero ning karbaw (lute playing of the carabao herder)/Talutang sa kapungkuhan (xylophone call of the mountaineer). But then too, the sound of lovers:
Solterong pinacusog ning gitara,
Sa kadurman, nangahas magharana
‘Nganing pagmate ipaagi sa kanta
Sa namomotan na daraga.
And finally, the poetry of the people:
Mga yaman kan katilipunan:
Tigsik sa ilinuman,
Rawit-dawit sa pamamanhikan,
“Aral” (pasyon) sa lamayan,
Gozos sa simbahan.
At the end, the poem turns out to be a lamentation for the increasing loss of the natural and traditional beauty of Catanduanes. Etasor blurts out in utter despair:
Ah, musika kang isla
Spiritu ning probinsya…
Haen ka na!
In the September 25, 2010 issue, the same sentiment is repeated, this time in an elegiac tone. In “Pano na su Tawo?” the poet sorely misses the paradisiacal Catanduanes:
haen na su regalong paraiso
sa mga ginahang tawo
hare sa puso ning Kaglalang?
haen na su urgullo
ning mga Catandunganon:
islang mabansay, matoninong?
Then, he exclaims mournfully
IN MEMORIAM!
wara na…. napara na?
He attributes such a loss to the corruption of the powerful and greedy, to the very “ipot ning sibilisasyon” (cvilization’s excreta), and wonders what will be the fate of the central aspect of all pursuits, the people:
sabi daa, asenso…
asenso sa ano?
pano na su tawo?
- The people
So Catanduanes is about the people, so shaped by the island’s geographic features, beautiful in its ruggedness. These people are foundered by the battery of natural challenges and the daily toil to eke out a living from the earth and waters, but essentially made possible only in the company of others. To be Catandunganon is to be in companionship with fellow Catandunganons nurtured by the providence of the Almighty. The poet sings of this truth to his compatriots (from “Espiritung Catandunganon, January 24, 2007):
Uya ako, kaibahan mo sa gabos na panahon dindi
sa satong magayon na isla: sa mga bay-bayon, sa
uma, sa tampi ning sapa, sa kani-paan o sa
pungko; dai naati sa dugui, nabuhay sa grasya
ning mahal na Diyos.
As a people then, the particular living circumstances of the Catandunganons had cultivated in them the quality of gentle hardiness, of abiding resilience that the outsider have often misconstrued as mdesty and indeed weakness: “Sabi daa maluya kita. . . . (It has been said that we are weak. . . ). But Etasor rejects such estimations by giving a run-down of a composite of virtues of the Catandunganons: as being mahuyo (gentle), matiyaga (diligent), pusuan (brave), maogmahon (happy), mapasensiya (patient).
On the occasion of the 62th Founding Anniversary of the Province of Catanduanes, Etasor composed an ode to the Catanduangons “Himno ning mga Catandunganon (October 24, 2007). In the “Koro” part, he celebrates the Catandunganons’ blessedness. He compares them to the abaca tree’s resilience, strong in its softness:
Ika Catandunganon!
Ginaha ning Dios na Poon;
Pinatalubo sa pagkamoot,
Nagpusog sa pagtubod.
Kabagay matubang na abaca,
Kung paghilgnon baging maluya;
Minadapa, minaluhod, minatindog
Sa cusog ning matuus na sabot.
(Otrohon ang Koro)
Basta maogma, anong bagyo;
Ang gabos cugos ning Dios!
In the September 8, 2010 issue of the Burabod, the same celebration of the virtues of the Catandunganons is reprised in a piece “Urgollong Catandunganon.” This time however, it is now rendered with a tinge of nostalgia;
kidayad gilumdumon
buhay na nagimathan
kaidtong panahon
pagreparo sa lambang sarô
hona mo kadugô
paggarang sa guráng
pagginahâ sa aki
turuwang-tuwangan
daramay-damayan
surugad-sugadan
gakasinarabutan
gakaminuruotan
What seals up the virtues of the Catandunganons is their sense of community: camaraderie, mutual help, understanding and care for each other. But these may be fast becoming a thing of the past and it serves well the present to bring them to mind that present generations may claim them back, as indeed Etasor’s Burabod is not just a chronicle of the Catandunganon virtue but an active advocacy of its preservation.