nameabledays Archive One

GARLIC STALL ON THE ROAD FROM BURGOS TO LAOAG

The dial does not measure
Distance, even though
We just stopped here, but the weight

Of distance upon us, the way
The vendors will weigh
Any of the bunches of garlic

Displayed on this stall,
On this stretch of highway
As if from and towards nowhere.

It is the weight of distance
Makes us strangers:
The tug of origins and destinations

That makes us spin
In the fleeting stasis of the present.
All this speed is a bit dizzying.

Presently these stalls
Will devour our kilometers
As we bow before the array

Of spices, dried fish,
Bags of iodized salt,
Vinegars and victuals.

Always we will pay
A fortune for these aromatic pearls,
No matter how much we haggle.

Watch how they thrive
On our hunger for the pure, the fresh,
What we conceive as authentic.

That is our penalty: They know,
Where we come from, wealth grows
Because it is eternally famished.

Marne L. Kilates
July 24, 2007