Our Words, Our Worlds/
Sasaomi, Lublubongmi
(Version arranged, and with continuity script by A S Agcaoili for the “Men’s Voices”, Tenny Theatre, Honolulu, HI, Feb. 23, 2008. Texts from the 3K Initiative Creative Workshop on Domestic Violence conducted by A S Agcaoili, with the participation of GUMIL Hawai’i, and several women from Local 5 Labor Union and other independent participants; the initiative was sponsored by the UH Ilokano Language and Literature (under its Community Language Program), and the Domestic Violence Clearinghouse and Legal Hotline, now Domestic Violence Action Center; premier recital at the 2007 International Conference on Ilokano and Amianan Languages and Cultures, Philippine Consulate General, Oct. 27, 2007)
B
This is only our voice.
This is only our voice.
L
In the silences, only in the silences
There we are left to cry in sadness
B
Let this come to an end, I say
Let this come to an end, I say
The colorful past has faded
The suffering you inflicted on me
They would never come a healing.
ALL
Our voices sold/our voices sold
Our lives not our own/our lives not our own
Or so we are told/or so we are told
Nothing do we own/nothing do we own.
B
Nothing, nada, nothing, nothing at all.
Like the beautiful song or spanking, my!!
Naty
Came so lost and spent
The woes, the frustrations, the regrets
But…listen, you did
Angie
Slowly, my confidence rebuilt
I began to sing, I began to sing
ALL
Songs of love, songs of freedom
Sing still we do, sing with the winds
Sing with the birds, sing with the waves
Cleo
Endlessly, I sing, sing my heart out
Naty
Even when you’re
Near and yet so far
ALL
He came into my life/She came into my life.
He came into my life/She came into my life.
ALL
Like the full moon.
Like the glimmer of light.
Carol
Like the storm
Aieee!, please don’t!
L
Our hearts were entwined
And we declared our union
B
And our love for each other bore fruit
L
And days gone by, oh my!
What a pity you do not understand!
B
You are a man who would not understand!
You are the hardship no one can bear!
You are the heaviness on my chest
You are the mistake, the good for nothing!
L
Why, o why, o my beloved why!
Those words are hard for the hearing!
B
What, to your face, excuse me
You look like the dishes!
L
‘What is it, Pinang, keep still!
Your poise, your manners, keep!
B
We are the women today and yesterday
We are the women violated by Adam!
B
When he says, come on, that good looking man
I say, come on, come to say I do not like him right away!
And then of course, he comes to flatter me
And when he smiles, heavens, I reach the glory!
L
Goodness gracious, her glistening teeth
On my chest comes the thumping of my heart.
Letty
What is this violence
What is this pain I bear
I make a minute mistake
And then I overly suffer?
Melita
Hello, he says, hello, dear, he says
Hello, I say, and my hello is forever
Perlita
Do you know what a parched land looks like?
Do you know how is it to beg for alms?
In the beginning, love is a beggar, and I was
And I remember our village of the wretched like I was.
Angie
And then Pedring, who made good, came from Hawai’i
He asked for my hand, and I have him all of my garden.
B
I do not know what I am talking about, I do not know the story
I begin from the violence that begins in the home
The father of all joys and all of sobbing and sorrow
Siring all those promises that are twin to forgetting
L
Stupid, stupid, woman
This woman is stupid!
B
Stupid, he says.
Graceless, he says.
And on my face would fall
All of his desires
His brutality, atrocity
Muffled sobbing, cries
All those wild power
In him that look like murder
L
You follow what I say,
I wear the pants.
B
No, no, I say, no I say
Do not hurt me, my love, I say
But the hand does not know control
And on my lips fall his big hands fall
Fely
The lips crack, the lips spill blood
Carol
And I spit my own blood
And I take in all the violence
And I take in all the doubts
And I take in all the wounds
B
And the blood mixes with the wind
And then with dust, and the waves
L
O, this is the curse, this violence
The curse of pride and anger
You end up with no one to go with you
Until you have anger itself has left you!
B
Come, come to ask forgiveness from my wound.
Come to beg for the purity of your love.
And I say yes, and he says, yes.
I am the fountain of forgiveness.
L
And we dance in the young evenings.
And we dance on our bed.
And our linens and pillows become witnesses
And themselves becoming witnesses
To another end: the bed sounds off
With another story of violence.
B
I remember the days
And fear grips me.
B
We have not been reared by violence
Nor anger nor just whimpering!
L
I kill you when you leave me.
That I vow and I promise
That I vow and I promise
That is what you say
And I see the death of stars
The moon, sobbing, day
L/B, ALTERNATE, choral
We put an end to the violence of men/
We put an end to violence to another
We cannot keep violence
The way to this is freedom
B
I am awakened by your loving caress
The way the breeze wakes up the dawn
And when you wake up
We build up our romantic morning
B
No more, I say. No more forgiving.
We put an end to the pain
To the violence
To the misery
To the suffering
All the cries with no name!
MELITA
No more, I say. No more!
B
I help myself. I help myself.
M
I help myself, I help myself.
ALL
We say we are here.
We are here.
We have come to set us free.
We have come to say we are free.
We say no to domestic violence.
We say no to this circle of violence.
We are here.
---30---
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