Poems Eligible for a Rhysling (Part 3)

On Friday, I posted a list of my 2016 speculative poems that are eligible for a Rhysling Award. Of those poems, these are the ones that appeared only in print in Popcorn Press's Halloween anthology Lupine Lunes: Horror Poems & Short Stories. Available at the press and also on Amazon. This first poem has to do with the aswang: a mythical Philippine monster. The specific kind of aswang featured here is the manananggal, a woman who can sever herself at the waist: the top half grows wings so she can fly in search of prey, leaving her bottom half wherever it is standing when she transforms out of her human-appearing form. Encounter on Good Friday — Cutud Village, north of Manila, 1936 On his straw mat, his banig, under the inky susurrus of the mosquito net hung from the walls of his nipa hut, a bachelor farmer named Santiago de la Cruz lounges half asleep, half dreaming of the Easter sunrise mass day after tomorrow and of today’s penitentes flogging their own backs into bloody crosshatch, a couple crucified for a handful of long minutes. Tiyago gazes up toward the now charcoal-tinged underside of his thatched palm-leaf roof and starts at an indistinct shadow above, shaped darkly like a crucified person. What? Tiyago rolls out of the net and fixes his eyes above. Yes, there is something there in the pitch black. Wait, is it a dark brown woman with her arms outstretched, gripping the almost invisible bamboo supports of the roof? A ghost? A hallucination? Tiyago rubs his eyes and looks again. Her eyes are dark red like dying coals. He crosses himself quickly, notices a rippling behind her like a mourning-dress curtain. Susmariosep, Tiyago whispers, she got wings like a bat! He slowly realizes there is nothing below her waist but a few brackish red loops of, what, guts, torn intestines? Wait, it’s not a whole figure. She has no legs. No legs! O my Jesus, an aswang . . . putang ina, she’s a mananananggal! The aswang smiles, teeth a dingy slate gray, and from her mouth slips a dingy blood-red thing like a snake or maybe more like a thick dark earthworm that writhes wildly, closer and closer to Tiyago. It’s her tongue, a ten-foot-long tongue. Hold on, she’s trying to suck my blood, the black harpy! He clenches his arms, his fists, shuts his eyes hard. The aswang’s tongue slinks, inches, nearer to his neck. His body in the shadowy center of the room seems to sprout fur, arms and legs thinning and crackling into wolf-like limbs. Tiyago is growing taller and bulkier, T-shirt and boxers ripping apart like tissue. He growls, dark yellowish fangs flashing out of the lengthening snout of his face. Tiyago is also an aswang, a shapeshifter churning into a huge black dog, larger than a man, standing wide on hind legs. The two monsters growl and snarl at each other, a tableau carved into the dusky sweaty air of the room. Then it stops. Both of them laugh, they snicker and snort, convulse in dark shrieks and screams of black humor. The manananggal pulls in her slimy tongue, waves at Tiyago, and swoops out of the window, her pterodactyl wings sighing velvety tik-tik, wak-wak sounds. Tiyago lifts his noble black head to the heavens and howls. —  Vince Gotera, Lupine Lunes: Horror Poems & Short Stories (Popcorn Press) In this next poem, the two aswang from the last poem have fallen in love. Clara, the manananggal, has been under suspicion by her fellow villagers of being an aswang. One night, they attack — almost like in the first Frankenstein movie, when people with torches and pitchforks hunt Boris Karloff's character. Santiago, the shapeshifting farmer from the previous poem, changes into his aswang form to rescue Clara. Villagers at Clara’s House, After Dark — hay(na)ku Ay, dios ko, malaking aso! Giant black dog attacked, rabid, rending . . . Aswang! . . . jumping up toward our necks, faces. Threw our torches, bright fangs. Aswang! Swung bolos against black fur, useless. Guns, no good, too fast. Aswang! We scattered, scared for our lives. Next day, Clara was gone. Aswang! —  Vince Gotera, Lupine Lunes: Horror Poems & Short Stories (Popcorn Press) In case you weren't able to figure it out from the context, the opening sentence of the previous poem, "Ay, dios ko, malaking aso!" means, in Tagalog, "Oh my god, a huge dog!" Aswang Wedding: Early Saturday Morn The aswang lovers held each other’s hand, kneeling at the teakwood communion rail of La Iglesia de San Agustin, the simple granite-walled Spanish chapel not far from the shores of Manila Bay. Heads lowered, the humble country couple waited while the parish priest, Padre Rey, drowsy, wished he was asleep in his bed. Raising his hand he droned, In nomine Patris et Filii . . . Dawn, a faint red, kindled stained glass the deep dark shade of blood draining from a body torn and shredded. Rings, sign of the cross, yes, but Padre would later tell how his heart sank at the end: fangs glinting in the bride’s smile, the groom’s mouth. —  Vince Gotera, Lupine Lunes: Horror Poems & Short Stories (Popcorn Press) The three poems above are part of my novella-in-poems, currently in progress, telling the story of these two aswang in their attempt to live a normal life — normal if one is a human, that is. After marrying, Santiago and Clara emigrate to the US, feeling they won't be persecuted there because most Americans don't know about aswang. In this next poem, the priest is not the same priest in the wedding poem directly above. Some readers have thought they were the same person, perhaps because in Lupine Lunes, these two poems are next to each other. The Good Father The folks at St. Mary’s Church thought well of their priest, Father Joseph Paolo. Every Sunday, after each of the masses, he would stand in the narthex and greet every person, shaking their hands, while above in the tower, the church bells would sonorously ring. The parishioners often recalled, our last priest would be damned rather than greet anyone. Father Joe was at his best with weddings, so friendly, so accommodating, so gracious, and each wedding couple felt genuinely special. Yup, no one better than Father, everyone always said. But Father Joe had a secret so damning some days he could hardly believe his vocation. His secret would send him to hell, he frequently thought, to the deepest, darkest ring of the Inferno. Sometimes, unable to sleep at night, his hands would burn and sting, and he wondered how his flock’s hands couldn’t feel the hot guilt in his grip. Every week, on Wednesday evenings, he would hold Bible Study and his voice would ring with authority and wonder, but inside his soul, he’d feel farther than ever from God. And truth. Because his own truth would keep him exiled forever from heaven. His secret? He’d damned someone to hell. Not just someone, his beloved. She was damned to perdition as if he had killed her, body and soul, with his own hands. In his last year of college, Joe Paolo had fallen in love. He was just wild about Francesca. And she adored him. Often they talked about a wedding: a silver dress, champagne, a four-tiered cake. Joe even went to her father and asked for Francesca’s hand—truly old-fashioned. He bought a ring, a lovely one with three diamonds, got down on one knee, and put the ring on her finger. But Joe got scared. And ran. Ran all the way to the damn seminary. And Francesca hanged herself. Even after he became a Father, Joe never told anyone, not even during confession. He ached for her hands to give him absolution, cool water from God’s font. With every wedding he hoped for peace. Then, one evening in the church, she came. It wouldn’t be as he thought: Francesca floating above, in a silvery gown, and she would forgive him. No. She appeared as an angry ghost in the dark chancel, ringed by fire, glowing chains of molten iron holding her down, apparition wedded to blackness and stinking filth, the smoke-heavy shrieking of the damned wafting around her. Francesca was whispering. She held out flaming hands and beckoned. Come to me, come to me. He fell to his knees, the poor Father. That night Father Paolo felt the closest ever to being eternally damned: an imprint appeared up on the cross, a woman’s hand burned into the wood, sweet Francesca’s softest caress, with an unburned gap for a wedding ring. —  Vince Gotera, Lupine Lunes: Horror Poems & Short Stories (Popcorn Press) Apropos of the next poem, I hope there won't be a full moon during the upcoming Presidential inauguration. Lupine Lunes, Starring Donald Trump Donald Trump, werewolf, turns in wash of moonlight, presidential, with fangs. Donald Trump sprouts wolf fur in tailored shirt, fresh from China. Donald Trump’s canines glow like radioactive little fingers, fluorescent plastic teeth. Donald Trump’s tail wags while he whines, howls at harvest moon. Donald Trump: “I’m The most handsome werewolf ever, believe me. Handsomest!” Donald Trump’s paws fumble in the voting booth, no opposable thumbs. “Donald Trump, President. And also Wolfman, so what? Everyone loves me.”                                 "Here's Donny," Daily Mail, 16 October 2015 —  Vince Gotera, Lupine Lunes: Horror Poems & Short Stories (Popcorn Press) I got the idea for this poem from the anthology's title "Lupine Lunes," announced in the book's call for submissions of poetry and fiction. The phrase is a truly witty title by the editor, Lester Smith, founder and editor of Popcorn Press, because of course werewolves are turned by the moon — la lune in French — when full. "Lune" is also the name of a poetic form, invented by Jack Collom: a three-line stanza with three words in line 1, five words in line 2, and three words in line 3. Friends, do check out Popcorn Press. For a number of years now, Lester Smith and the press have published a Halloween anthology. Always fun. Popcorn Press has published many wonderful collections and anthologies. And pick up a copy of Lupine Lunes at the press or on Amazon. Won’t you comment, please? Love to know what you’re thinking. To comment, look for a red line below that starts Posted by, then click once on the word comments in that line. If you don’t find the word "comments" in that line, then look for a blue link below that says Post a comment and click it once. Thanks! Ingat, everyone.  ヅ  If you got here from my list of Rhysling-eligible poems, please click here to go back to the list.   P.S. I just realized today (11 May 2017) that I left a poem off. All Zombies, Coming and Going —  a somersault abecedarian ... read first down left column and then down right column same words, new punctuation All Bury Caskets. Doom’s Exhausted. Forever Green Horrific Inside Jujubes Kissing Lips, Miniature, Never Oblique. Plan Quiet Reveries, Secure Trees. Under Visible Wound, eXit Your Zipper.                     Zipper Your eXit Wound, Visible Under Trees’ Secure Reveries, Quiet. Plan Oblique Never Miniature Lips Kissing Jujubes Inside Horrific Green. Forever Exhausted, Doom's Caskets Bury All. —  Vince Gotera, Lupine Lunes: Horror Poems & Short Stories (Popcorn Press) (Added 11 May 2017)