Brown child [poem]
Media
Part of The Carolinian
- Title
- Brown child [poem]
- Creator
- Faigao, C.
- Language
- English
- Year
- 1959
- Rights
-
- Fulltext
- Brown Child • by C. FAIGAO He was a watcher of the forest fires; The hunger for the sea was in his eyes; He heard far voices calling in the night; He felt a hunger gnawing in the mind. He crossed the oceans through the mist and rains To where the beaches checked the flight Of vintas folding multi-colored sails. His lore was of the jungles and the plains; He learned the language of the purling waves; For him there rose no suns beyond the gates; He was strengthened by his native faith, The brown child friendly to the tropic sun. There blew breezes from the mains To make strange mixture of the loam and sod. He burned rare incense for his native gods Until a nnc world opened, and the drums Of Empire broke the silence, droves of doves Perched on crossed silhouettes against the suns, And new worlds burst within him, lit his life, Leavening unredeemed dust W ith inner giowings spiritually bright Slowly the days datvned-died with certain flight,— A new star shone upon the sunburned child— Bared him new mansions where the soul may hide, Pointed theA^ay where new horizons rise, Adorned the arbour where may hide the dream, .Made the blade bloom to life, Made this the basis of the apothegm. Made mankind the inspirer and the theme Of his brave dreams, to warble to the breeze, Making the need of others his own need, Making their hopes his hope, their dread his dread. The brown child has become a mature man, Heir to the composite deed. In him the blood which in his forebears ran. The world grows smaller in his mental span, A world of rebelling atomies that dance. How keep his balance in a world grown mad, when the taut string snaps? challenges, he will hold his throne. He> will be faithful to his past. The Brown Man will not die—will hold his own! Awarded First Prize in the Literary Contests in connection with the Golden Jubilee of the Educational System in the Philippines, 1951. Printed by (olholic Trode School, 19U Oroquielo, Monilo