"ME AGAINST YOU"

I can't breathe in this white uniform. It's so tight.

Release me.

Well, Thank yo for your kind words. I know, right. I

already

expected this. I'm not surprised.

Oh! I haven't introduced myself to some of you. For

those

who don't know me, which only a few don't, I'm

Genuino Ontangco,

a smart young man or I should say, a genius. Do you

need someone

to answer your problems? I'm the perfect person to

approach. You

asked why? Because, I know everything. Give me

those equations, I'll

simplify it. Give me those problems, I'll solve it. Give

me that piece, I'll

correct it. Oh............ It feels good to be a genius

Sometimes I wondered, maybe if I was born a long

time ago, then

I would have created all the inventions in this world.

Maybe yes! Maybe...

..............yes! Why can't I? I know everything,

remember? Hahahahaha

My mother calls me Gene, my nickname. She has

been my inspiration,

or i mean assistant ever since. How can she be my

mentor? I know a lot more

than her! My father, Oh! i don't know him. I refuse to

know him. Some people told

me, he was a criminal, a thief, a man of pure evil, a

product which sent him to jail.

Some people told me, he has changed. I don't believe

them. I tend to react when

they connect him to me. I can't stand it.

I hate those people who stand in my way, and does

something without my

approval. Only I, know what's right.

"Mom!!!! Where's the documents in my table?" I

asked.

"Oh! I thought that's a trash, I already threw it away."

She answered

"I told you never to touch anything here, you stupid

moron!"

"I'm still your mother young man! You can't say that to

me"

"Why can't I? I know more than you coz you're a

brainless idiot!

Yes! That's true!"

Then, she slapped me in the face. I punched her

hard, and laughed as she dropped

to the ground. You should have seen her face while

she fought for her life! She's dead!

Hahahaha. What a relief.

Oh! Here they are again! Stop! I can't breathe in this

white uniform. It's so tight.

Release me! I should be free. Release me! Release

me!

Release me!

"Promise Land"

"Where am I?"

"Is this the real world?"

A lot of things are on my mind. I may be young and

innocent, but not ignorant. I can clearly see what's

present.

I can only imagine life when the world was first

created, a beautiful scene yet to be exploited.A dash

of green and blue then add the bright yellow sunshine

that lights up the day. God gave us a world full of

promise. He wanted us to use it, take care of it and

make sure that there is plenty for everybody.

The water is not blue as it was.

The air we breath is not healthy anymore.

The forest that used to be rich and full, nowhere to be

seen.

Dead

Denuded

Destroyed

"What happened to the promised land?"

"How dare we ruin it!"

"Look at it people! look at it!"

"If the world could only speak, it would tell us how

much it hurts."

"All of us can do something but not everyone is willing

to do it."

"Now, I can't imagine what the future holds."

Living

Hoping

Praying

The chances are getting thinner everytime. Time is

running out. We better do it now or pay the price later.

Let's rebuild this world and plant new life for a new

day.

A GLASS OF COLD WATER

Everybody calls me young, beautiful, wonderful. Am I? Look at

my hair, my lips, my red rosy cheeks and a pair of blinkering

eyes.

I remember, somebody says that I look like my mother that I

look like my mother. But that when she was young.

Now, I am much lovelier than she is. I’m a mortal Venus.

Oops! What time is it? I must get ready for the party!

Beep-beep…!A-huh! Here they are! Yes, I’m coming!

"Child, are you still there?"

"Hmp! That’s my mama"

"Child, are you still there? Will you please get me a glass of

cold water?"

"Mama, I’m in a hurry!"

"Please child, try to get me a glass of cold water."

"Mama, please, try to get it on your own."

"Please child, try to get me a glass of cold water!"

At the party, I danced and danced the whole night.

You see, I can’t leave the party at once. I have to danced

with everybody who proposed to me. At last, the party is over.

I’m very tired. Very, very tired.

So, I went home to tell mama what happened.

"Mama, I’m home! It’s very quiet. "Mama, I’m home!"

Nobody answers.

Where is she? I look for her in the sala, but she’s not there.

Where is she? A-huh! In the kitchen!

I saw my mama, lying down on the floor, dead. With a glass on

her hand. I remember, she tried to get it.

Oh, God, just for the glass of cold water! Mama! Mama! Oh,

Mama!

"Bad Girl"

Hey! Everybody seems to be staring at me.. You! You! All of you! How dare you to stare at me? Why? Is it because I'm a bad girl? A bad girl I am, A good for nothing teen ager, a problem child? That's what you call me! I smoke. I drink. I gamble at my young tender age. I lie. I cheat, and I could even kill, If I have too. Yes, I'm a bad girl, but where are my parents? You! You! You are my good parents? My good elder brother and sister in this society where I live? Look…look at me…What have you done to me? You have pampered and spoiled me, neglected me when I needed you most! Entrusted me to a yaya, whose intelligence was much lower than mine! While you go about your parties, your meetings and gambling session… Thus… I drifted away from you! Longing for a father's love, yearning for a mother's care! As I grew up, everything changed! You too have changed! You spent more time in your poker, majong tables, bars and night clubs. You even landed on the headlines of the newspaper as crooks, peddlers and racketeers. Now, you call me names, accuse me of everything I do to myself? Tell me! How good are you? If you really wish to ensure my future… Then hurry….hurry back home! Where I await you, because I need you…

Protect me from all evil influences that will threaten at

my very own

understanding…

But if I am bad, really bad…then, you've got to help

me!

Help me! Oh please…Help me!

"Juvenile Delinquent"

Am I a juvenile delinquent? I’m a teenager, I’m

young, young at heart in mind. In this position, I’m

carefree, I enjoy doing nothing but to drink the

wine of pleasure. I seldom go to school, nobody

cares!. But instead you can see me roaming

around. Standing at the nearby canto (street). Or

else standing beside a jukebox stand playing the

nerve tickling bugaloo. Those are the reasons, why

people, you branded me delinquent, a juvenile

delinquent.

My parents ignored me, my teachers sneered at me

and my friends, they neglected me. One night I

asked my mother to teach me how to appreciate

the values in life. Would you care what she told

me? "Stop bothering me! Can’t you see? I had to

dress up for my mahjong session, some other time

my child". I turned to my father to console me, but,

what a wonderful thing he told me. "Child, here’s

500 bucks, get it and enjoy yourself, go and ask

your teachers that question".

And in school, I heard nothing but the echoes of

the voices of my teachers torturing me with these

words. "Why waste your time in studying, you

can’t even divide 100 by 5! Go home and plant

sweet potatoes".

I may have the looks of Audrey Hepburn, the

calmly voice of Nathalie Cole. But that’s not what

you can see in me. Here’s a young girl who needs

counsel to enlighten her way and guidance to

strenghten her life into contentment.

Honorable judge, friends and teachers…is this the

girl whom you commented a juvenile delinquent?.

My parents ignored me, my teachers sneered at me

and my friends, they neglected me. One night I

asked my mother to teach me how to appreciate

the values in life. Would you care what she told

me? "Stop bothering me! Can’t you see? I had to

dress up for my mahjong session, some other time

my child". I turned to my father to console me, but,

what a wonderful thing he told me. "Child, here’s

500 bucks, get it and enjou yourself, go and ask

your teachers that question".

And in school, I heard nothing but the echoes of

the voices of my teachers torturing me with these

words. "Why waste your time in studying, you

can’t even divide 100 by 5! Go home and plant

sweet potatoes".

I may have the looks of Audrey Hepburn, the

calmly voice of Nathalie Cole. But that’s not what

you can see in me. Here’s a young girl who needs

counsel to enlighten her way and guidance to

strenghten her life into contentment.

Honorable judge, friends and teachers…is this the

girl whom you commented a juvenile delinquent?.

"The Unpardonable Crime"

Only one living creature seemed to take any

notice of his existence: this was an old St.

Bernard, who used to come and lay his big head

with its mournful eyes on Christophe's knees

when Christophe was sitting on the seat in front

of the house. They would look long at each other.

Christophe would not drive him away Unlike the

sick Goethe, the dog's eyes had no uneasiness for

him Unlike him, he had no desire to cry: "Go

away! . . . Thou goblin thou shalt not catch me,

whatever thou doest!"

He asked nothing better than to be engrossed by

the dog's suppliant sleepy eyes and to help the

beast: he felt that there must be behind them an

imprisoned soul imploring his aid.

In those hours when he was weak with suffering,

torn alive away from life, devoid of human

egoism, he saw the victims of men, the field of

battle in which man triumphed in the bloody

slaughter of all other creatures: and his heart was

filled with pity and horror. Even in the days when

he had been happy he had always loved the

beasts: he had never been able to bear cruelty

towards them: he had always had a detestation of

sport, which he had never dared to express for

fear of ridicule: but his feeling of repulsion had

been the secret cause of the apparently

inexplicable feeling of dislike he had had for

certain men: he had never been able to admit to

his friendship a man who could kill an animal for

pleasure. It was not sentimentality: no one knew

better than he that life is based on suffering and

infinite cruelty: no man can live without making

others suffer. It is no use closing our eyes and

fobbing ourselves off with words. It is no use

either coming to the conclusion that we must

renounce life and sniveling like children. No. We

must kill to live, if, at the time, there is no other

means of living. But the man who kills for the

sake of killing is a miscreant. An unconscious

miscreant, I know. But, all the same, a miscreant.

The continual endeavor of man should be to

lessen the sum of suffering and cruelty: that is

the first duty of humanity.

In ordinary life those ideas remained buried in

Christophe's inmost heart. He refused to think of

them. What was the good? What could he do? He

had to be Christophe, he had to accomplish his

work, live at all costs, live at the cost of the weak.

... It was not he who had made the universe. . . .

Better not think of it, better not think of it. ...

But when unhappiness had dragged him down,

him, too, to the level of the vanquished, he had to

think of these things. Only a little while ago he

had blamed Olivier for plunging into futile

remorse and vain compassion for all the

wretchedness that men suffer and inflict. Now he

went even farther: with all the vehemence of his

mighty nature he probed to the depths of the

tragedy of the universe: he suffered all the

sufferings of the world, and was left raw and

bleeding. He could not think of the animals

without shuddering in anguish. He looked into the

eyes of the beasts and saw there a soul like his

own, a soul which could not speak: but the eyes

cried for it:

"What have I done to you? Why do you hurt me?"

He could not bear to see the most ordinary sights

that he had seen hundreds of times —a calf crying

in a wicker pen, with its big, protruding eyes,

with their bluish whites and pink lids, and white

lashes, its curly white tufts on its forehead, its

purple snout, its knock-kneed legs:—a lamb being

carried by a peasant with its four legs tied

together, hanging head down, trying to hold its

head up, moaning like a child, bleating and lolling

its gray tongue:—fowls huddled together in a

basket:—the distant squeals of a pig being bled to

death:—a fish being cleaned on the kitchen-table.

. . . The nameless tortures which men inflict on

such innocent creatures made his heart ache.

Grant animals a ray of reason, imagine what a

frightful nightmare the world is to them: a dream

of cold-blooded men, blind and deaf, cutting their

throats, slitting them open, gutting them, cutting

them into pieces, cooking them alive, sometimes

laughing at them and their contortions as they

writhe in agony. Is there anything more atrocious

among the cannibals of Africa? To a man whose

mind is free there is something even more

intolerable in the sufferings of animals than in the

sufferings of men. For with the latter it is at least

admitted that suffering is evil and that the man

who causes it is a criminal. But thousands of

animals are uselessly butchered every day

without a shadow of remorse. If any man were to

refer to it, he would be thought ridiculous.—And

that is the unpardonable crime. That alone is the

justification of all that men may suffer. It cries

vengeance upon God. If there exists a good God,

then even the most humble of living things must

be saved. If God is good only to the strong, if

there is no justice for the weak and lowly, for the

poor creatures who are offered up as a sacrifice

to humanity, then there is no such thing as

goodness, no such thing as justice.

"The Plea of an Aborted Fetus"

LET THIS PRECIOUS ANGELS LIVE !

"SET ME FREE. LET ME LIVE, I DESERVE TO BE

BORN, I WANT TO LIVE. FOR HEAVENS SAKE, HAVE

PITY."

Ladies and Gentlemen, dear fathers and mother,

listen to my plea, listen to my story. I could have

been the 17th Lady President of the Philippines

Republic, had you given me the chance to live, had

you not deprived me of my life, had you not taken

away my privilege to be born.

Some eleven years ago, a healthy ovum started to

generate in the womb of a woman with six other

children. My coming should be a herald of joy, a

symbol of love incarnate but to my mommy it was

a burden, a problem, an additional mouth to feed.

To Dad, it was a mistake, an effect of Mom's

carelessness for not taking the contraceptive pills.

One gloomy day in June, my unexpected coming

was confirmed. It was a painful decision. I could

sense the imminent danger as Mom got inside the

abortion room. I was an unwanted child. No one

loved me. No one cared. I was a rejected being, a

tiny lump slowly forming into human being with

human soul. I was already alive, kicking,

struggling. My heart was already beating and my

thumb had already the unique mark. As I was

holding to my mother's womb a splash of heat

came all over me. I writhed in extreme pain.

-- "Mom, why have you done this to me? Am I not

the flesh of your own flesh, the blood of your own

blood?"

The rubber suction caught my tiny limbs and

mercilessly twisted it slowly cutting it from my

body. I struggled for my life. 1,2,3 and the first

part of me came out.

-- "Mom, why have you permitted this? Am I not

Dad's pledge of love to you?"

Then it was followed by another rubber suction

sucking the other part moving it with force until

both were fully amputated.

-- "Mom, why have you done this to me? Am I not

God's image you promised to love and protect?"

Then i felt shaken once, twice, several times until

I do not know anymore what has been going

around. I gushed forth my last breath...

Then came the final blow, my head - the

abortionist termed as No. I was totally cut from my

torso: total annihilation.

GONE IS MY CHANCE TO LEAD A HEALTHY

NORMAL LIFE.

GONE IS MY CHANCE TO BEHOLD THE MANY

LOVELY THINGS GOD CREATED FOR US.

GONE IS THE PROMISE OF A BLISSFUL LIFE.

“Vengeance Is Not Ours,

It’s God’s”

Alms, alms, alms. Spare me a piece of bread.

Spare me your mercy. I am a child so young, so

thin, and so ragged.Why are you staring at me?

With my eyes I cannot see but I know that you

are all staring at me. Why are you whispering to

one another? Why? Do you know my mother? Do

you know my father? Did you know me five years

ago?

Yes, five years of bitterness have passed. I can

still remember the vast happiness mother and I

shared with each other. We were very happy

indeed.

Suddenly, five loud knocks were heard on the

door and a deep silence ensued. Did the cruel

Nippon’s discover our peaceful home? Mother ran

to Father’s side pleading. “Please, Luis, hide in

the cellar, there in the cellar where they cannot

find you,” I pulled my father’s arm but he did not

move. It seemed as though his feet were glued to

the floor.

The door went “bang” and before us five ugly

beasts came barging in. “Are you Captain Luis

Santos?” roared the ugliest of them all. “Yes,”

said my father. “You are under arrest,” said one

of the beasts. They pulled father roughly away

from us. Father was not given a chance to bid us

goodbye.

We followed them mile after mile. We were

hungry and thirsty. We saw group of Japanese

eating. Oh, how our mouths watered seeing the

delicious fruits they were eating,

Then suddenly, we heard a voice call, “Consuelo. .

. . Oscar. . . . Consuelo. . . . Oscar. . . . Consuelo. . .

. Oscar. . . .” we ran towards the direction of the

voice, but it was too late. We saw father hanging

on a tree. . . . dead. Oh, it was terrible. He had

been badly beaten before he died. . . . and I cried

vengeance, vengeance, vengeance! Everything

went black. The next thing I knew I was nursing

my poor invalid mother.

One day, we heard the church bell ringing “ding-

dong, ding-dong!” It was a sign for us to find a

shelter in our hide-out, but I could not leave my

invalid mother, I tried to show her the way to the

hide-out.

Suddenly, bombs started falling; airplanes were

roaring overhead, canyons were firing from

everywhere. “Boom, boom, boom, boom!” Mother

was hit. Her legs were shattered into pieces. I

took her gently in my arms and cried, “I’ll have

vengeance, vengeance!” “No, Oscar. Vengeance,

it’s God’s,” said mother.

But I cried out vengeance. I was like a pent-up

volcano. “Vengeance is mine not the Lord’s”. “No,

Oscar. Vengeance is not ours, it’s God’s” these

were the words from my mother before she died.

Mother was dead and I was blind. Vengeance is

not ours? To forgive is divine but vengeance is

sweeter. That was five years ago, five years. . . .

Alms, alms, alms. Spare me a piece of bread.

Spare me your mercy. I am a child so young, so

thin, and so ragged. Vengeance is not ours, it’s

God’s. . . . It’s. . . . God’s. . It’s… advocacy