i. iniibig ko ang Pilipinas
i learn home in a classroom
learn patriotism from a textbook
and a song
learn to love my country
with a mother tongue i stutter through
with the accent i pick up like scabs from
the schoolyard, turning
this mouth into scar tissue and yet
my tisay dripping coconut milk
onto colonised soil
brown husks turned into a stand-in
for oil—to bear a body
to ready the ground for walking
and i am a person torn apart
i bear the brunt of the fall
i float across an ocean and let my roots
become me
ii. aking lupang sinilangan
i was born tethered
to the womb
my apu’s nose laying claim
to my face
she will call me dupi after
the yearly rain
and i will see her as a dirt road
the final landmark to this story
evidence of a bloodline
returned to the earth
in another country, it is winter
in another country, i am born
a ghost
fists clamped around a memory
i ask for proof that i exist
i hold my breath
and wait
iii. tahanan ng aking lahi
i try to turn this body mirror
hold it up to the light
to catch the sun
my people do not look like me
i say a prayer to darken
the skin
wonder if a shadow can
rub off on me
i shout my name into the void
so they know where i come from
this tongue my only unfurling
from foreignness
and even that, heavy with
english and my white mother’s cooking
i am an immigrant in
every country
even the ones i call
home
Note: This poem uses as subtitles the first three lines of the Panatang Makabayan, or Philippine Patriotic Oath. These lines are translated as follows:
I love the Philippines
The land of my birth
The home of my people
About the author
Kaya Lattimore is a Filipina-Australian writer and performance poet. As a mestiza, immigrant, and queer womxn, her writing obsessions include diaspora, family histories, racial and queer identity, and language. Her poetry has appeared or is forthcoming in Umbel & Panicle, The Brown Orient, Cicerone Journal and Not Very Quiet.