This month's featured poet is Paolo Javier whose first poetry collection, entitled The Time At The End Of This Writing , is forthcoming in early 2004 from Ahadada Press (Canada). You can check future “Babaylan Speaks” for how to obtain Paolo's book when it is released. Meanwhile, CONGRATULATIONS to Paolo and here is a poem from his debut collection

(untitled)

can I be more
curled up than
this? that

can't be--
on your lap as
a baby my
head is a ripening

fruit.
quiet now--
a morning

seen in your
own still
life.

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FILIPINO BLOGS!

More and more Filipinos are putting up blogs in the internet! Here is a selection of blogs by Filipino writers or blogs which may not be only about literature but still touches often enough on literature and art. A special thanks to Ian Rosales Casocot for his helpful list that we add to below (in alphabetical order by last name):

JOEY AYALA: http://www.joeyayala.com/blog.htm
MICHELLE BAUTISTA: “Gura” at http://gura.blogspot.com
LILLEDESHAN BOSE: http://hickypox.blogspot.com
LIA BULAONG: http://cheesedip.com
IAN ROSALES CASOCOT: http://secretdancer.blogspot.com
MITZIE CORREA: http://patatasproject.blogspot.com
CARLOMAR ARCANGEL DAOANA: http://www.blurty.com/users/seachild
CORINNE LEILANI DOMINGO: “Aiha'a” at http://aihaa.typepad.com/aihaa
CATERINA FAKE: http://caterina.net/
JEAN GIER (1): “Blue Kangaroo” at http://nightjar2.blogspot.com/
JEAN GIER (2): “Diaryo” at http://diaryo.blogspot.com/
LUIS KATIGBACK, ADAM DAVID, INDIRA ENDAYA, BERNICE ROLDAN ET AL: http://indira.exultrade.com/elephant
GABRIELA LEE: http://sundialgirl.blogspot.com
PAOLO MANALO: http://www.livejournal.com/users/hipaolo
VICTOR MEDRANO: http://ca.geocities.com/vixcafe/
AIMEE NEZHUKUMATATHL: “Gila Monster" at http://aimeenez.blogspot.com
ARI NGASEO: http://pupuplatter.blogspot.com
MA. CHRISTINA ONGPIN: http://creatingaspace101.blogspot.com
RHETT PASCUAL: “Tatang's Karinderia” at http://karinderia.blogspot.com
KAREN C. PIOQUINTO: at http://www.geocities.com/karen_pioquinto/plumbago_trails.html
BARBARA JANE REYES: “"barbara jane's got nothin to say" at http://bjanepr.blogspot.com
JODIE REYES: “Haring Makata” at http://haringmakata.blogspot.com/
EDGAR SAMAR: http://kalyekundiman.blogspot.com
LENY M. STROBEL: “Kathang-Pinay” at http://kathang-pinay.blogspot.com/
EILEEN TABIOS (1): Corpsepoetics (formerly WinePoetics), Eileen's primary blog at http://winepoetics.blogspot.com
EILEEN TABIOS (2): Gasps, Eileen's blog of “first draft, last draft” poems at http://loveslastgasps.blogspot.com/
EILEEN TABIOS (3): Hay(na)ku, a blog of a Filipino 21st century poetic form at http://eileentabios.blogspot.com/
NEVA KARES TALLADEN: http://neva.blogspot.com
ASTRID TOBIAS: http://butasnachucks.blogspot.com
NAYA VALDELLON: http://ellipsesparentheses.blogspot.com
BENITO M. VERGARA, JR.: http://www.thewilyfilipino.com/blog/
NICCOLO VITUG: http://pebblesandsex.blogspot.com

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BEST FILIPINO AMERICAN POETRY

SUBMISSION CALL
for
2003 BEST FILIPINO AMERICAN POETRY

Editor, Eileen Tabios
Deadline: December 31, 2003

"the story of the collective,
the many eyes of a single pineapple"
--Joseph O. Legaspi

This is a Call to Filipino Poets who would like to have their 2003-published poems considered for this groundbreaking volume. Submissions should feature the poem(s) and the name and date of journal(s) that published the poem(s). Please submit no more than five (5) published poems as candidates for this volume (it is highly unlikely that more than one poem per poet would be chosen).

By 2003, we mean the calendar year 2003. You can submit poems ahead of the journals' release dates, as long as you know that the journal will be out by the end of the calendar 2003.

You can submit in two ways: by e-mail to PinoyPoetics@aol.com or by snailmail to

Eileen Tabios
2275 Broadway, #312
San Francisco, CA 94115

Please note that, unless you happen to be an acquaintance of Eileen Tabios, she will not open any attachments to your e-mailed submission (due to virus concerns). If your poems have special formatting issues or would not otherwise show up clearly by being placed within the body of the e-mail, it's best that you snailmail your submission.

In addition to print publications, certain online journals are eligible; some examples are in the 2002 BEST AMERICAN POETRY issue, guest-edited by Robert Creeley, which includes poems first published in online journals -- versus, say, those set up by your mother (loving though your mother may be) or websites that do self-publication. Also eligible are poems first published in books that are released by (non-vanity) publishing houses.

This is a volume of "Filipino American" poetry -- for this purpose, prior print publications will need to be U.S.-American, which means Filipinos living outside the United States are eligible if their poems were published in U.S.-American journals. The online journals obviously transcend the limits of physical geography; thus, for this purpose, eligible authors are required to be Filipino-American authors.

No Filipino-American poet has ever appeared in the BEST AMERICAN POETRY (BAP) series. However, a poem by Joseph O. Legaspi, entitled "Visiting the Manongs in a Convalescent Home in Delano" had been accepted by guest editor Adrienne Rich for the 1996 BAP volume. For a variety of reasons, that poem was not included in the printed version of 1996 BAP. To rectify this unfortunate omission, Legaspi's poem will be featured within the Introduction to this upcoming BEST FILIPINO AMERICAN POETRY (BFAP) anthology.
This 2003 BEST FILIPINO AMERICAN POETRY is expected to be released concurrently with the PINOYPOETICS anthology, edited by Nick Carbo, in Fall 2004. It is expected that BFAP, by providing a snapshot of recent Filipino poetry, will facilitate, when combined with PINOYPOETICS , a more comprehensive look at Filipino Poetry. BFAP also provides another venue for Filipino poets to share their works since PINOYPOETICS is, foremost, a collection of poetics essays rather than a collection of poems.
What PINOYPOETICS and BFAP share in common is a redress of the invisibility of Filipino English-language poetry that caused Nick Carbo to write in his introduction to PINOYPOETICS :

"Filipino poetry written in English or Tagalog does not seem to exist to the big New York publishing houses and most American English departments."

Well, why need Filipinos wait for others to recognize our existence? We already exist. Our poetry already exists. Let us be the ones to make our poems more accessible. Please join us in this project through submissions, spreading the word, and future support.

For questions, e-mail BFAP Editor Eileen Tabios at PinoyPoetics@aol.com