Simbolismo: Signs, Identities, Meanings

From the volcanic mountains of Albay, the Philippines, where the earth remembers itself through ash, river, ruins, roads, and green meadows, these poems by Roseville N. Nidea rise with a pulse that is both intimate and elemental. They speak from a landscape where memory is not fixed in the past but breathes in the living present, held in the curve of a shoreline, the quiet, ashen horizon created by Mt. Mayon, the hush before the rain, and the way names are spoken in endearment. Writing from the heart, the poet listens closely to her environment as a living archive, allowing wind, the sky, earth, and the horizon to enter the poems’ realms not as backdrop but as co-authors. Each line is shaped by attentiveness to what has been lost, what endures, and what must be named carefully so it can remain in thought and memory.

Language, in these poems, is not merely a tool but a threshold between the poet’s soul and the world. Words are chosen as one chooses seeds, aware that meaning grows differently depending on where it is planted. Drawing from the deepest recesses of her memory that is personal, ancestral, cultural, and ecological, Roseville discovers the self as porous, formed in relation to space and place and to others, to stories and histories, both spoken and unspoken. Read these poems as her invitation into this slow, reflective knowing and being, where understanding deepens not through certainty but through persistent questioning and solemn introspection about life and the world, aided by memory, guided by time and wisdom. Listen to her voice as you read her words in silence and look within yourself to realise that the world she inhabits is a world that you and I can relate to and understand.

And yet, let us summon ourselves that these poems do not remain only with what has been broken or remembered; they lean forward, attentive to one's becoming. Pain is neither denied nor romanticised. It is acknowledged as a force that shapes, presses, and refines, much like heat beneath the land. From this recognition emerges a quiet form of courage: the willingness to imagine a future that is shaped by loss, pain, remembering, and healing. As we embrace what lies ahead, we trust that the self is still unfolding, still capable of tenderness and change, and still evolving. In this forward gaze, becoming is an act of care, a decision to remain open, to carry grief without being emptied by it, and to step into the unknown with a heart that, though scarred, continues to listen, to speak, and to hope. 

Cagsawa Ruins with Mayon Volcano in the background. Oil on canvas. 16" x 24" by J. Bulaong/Mariliza Bulaong/mlizgnoarey (2012). An image of this painting was uploaded to Flickr on 07 December 2014. Consent to use the image requested through the artist's Instagram account.