Awit ng Dahon
Nalimot ko na ang samyo ng bukid,
Ang bango ng himpapawid sa dapithapon.
Ngiti ng mga bulaklak sa parang, di’y
Naglaho sa ala-alang ulap ng kahapon.
Liban ngayon…
Hindi habang hawak ang iyong kamay,
Habang ang labi mo ay malapit sa akin;
Na sa bawat salita mo ay isang panaginip,
Ng nakaraang liwanag ng araw sa tagsibol.
Halika…
Ating palayain ang yakap ng pag-ibig,
At balikan ang mga nakalimutang Sayaw—
—sabay sa awitin ng mga Dahon.
National
“Let’s talk about your life.”
For the hundredth time, the young intern glanced at his watch thinking about the scheduled rounds for the morning, distracted. He was oblivious of the uncharacteristic silence that don’t usually reside in the wards of public health institutions; a silence which nursed the eerie calm of moaning and silent mutterings from the catatonic and the brain dead in the sanitized room. It was clear to him that whatever he does, mistake or otherwise, he will receive the full pardon from souls damned to forgetting how it was to live with consequences. Nothing matters, he told himself; and by the look of the resident-on-duty nothing matters whatsoever.
“Mr. Trueno, I am the one to ask questions,” replied the intern. “Not you.”
“Just call me Eddie,” said the patient in reply. “Or just Ed.”
“Ok Ed, I’m your attending. Tell me what happened.”
“You asked me that yesterday.”
The young doctor was surprised and recovered enough of himself to note it in his progress notes. These kind of patients usually suffer from short to immediate term memory loss; however, the field of psychiatry has developed significant improvement from years of research to account for remissions such as these. He tapped his pen nervously for a moment and tried to remember uselessly the intricacies of neuronal pathways to explain Ed’s reply— the intern must have an answer ready in case his superiors question his observations.
“Mr. Ed, do you remember what we talked about yesterday.”
“About my wife.”
“And he left you. Yes.”
“And about rainclouds and traveling airplanes.”
“We didn’t—”
“You see, Doctor, I want to talk about your life.”
“I need to take your history, Ed, in order to treat you.”
“But everybody here asked me,” Ed replied, his hands showing faint signs of tremor. “Same questions, I hear. Answers.”
Experience told the intern that situations like these required him to talk less and just listen to the senseless babbling of the insane. He tried to stifle the nervous agitation that swelled swiftly to controlled irritation. Noticing his colleagues enjoying their coffee while having loud casual conversations behind the nurse’s station, he gathered his thoughts and concentrated on making furious notes in his chart.
“Today I want to talk about my dog.”
“Yes, Ed, what about him!”
“His name was Pen.”
“Go on.”
“He was hit by a car one night. My fault. I never should have left him outside.”
“It happened.”
“He cried. Pen wailed not like dogs do when they’re hurt badly; but like a baby.”
“Go on,” the intern managed to say despite his revulsion.
“I had to cut off his two broken hindlegs. In pain, we cried.”
The morning sun streamed through the transparent, wide windows of the room, making the microscopic dusts visible, suspended floating light on bleach-flavored air of the hospital. The intern was sweating under his immaculate white coat, beginning to feel uncomfortable as he tried to avoid the fervent stare of his patient, which seems to penetrate the wholeness of his soul. These are just flights of consciousness, he said to himself, from an irreversibly dying cortex.
“Continue.”
“It pained me, every time I see him try…”
“Try what?”
“Try to stand every time I wake up, and share my misery…”
“When you’re wife left you,” interrupted the young doctor. “Tell me the circumstances of your—”
“I killed him. ”
The patient’s last statement stunned the intern out of his façade of professional indifference, not so much as the weirdness of the tale but mostly the weight of remorse that reverberated from it. He stared for the longest time at his patient as the poor man curled up into a fetal position and let out an animal-like cry that sent the health staff running to the bed.
“What happened?” asked the nurse.
“I don’t know,” replied the intern.
“He’s crazy, what do you expect,” said the resident-on-duty. “Give his chemical restraints. The usual.”
The intern took a loaded syringe and introduced it to the IV line. It took a several moment’s effect before the patient calmed down enough for the young doctor to ask a few more questions during that moment of lucidity that comes prior to sedation. Rationalization. It is always rationalization, he thought, that keeps the man sane in all things terrible that comes with existence.
“You did what you have to do, Sir.”
“To whom?”
“Pen, Sir. I know you loved him.”
“That’s why I want to know about your life.”
“My life is nothing.”
“You remind me of him.”
