Is it winter
yet? I ask because I am always busy waiting
for snow or
wishing for deer to trample through
Manila’s cramped streets,
to find my backyard littered and prepared
with round, perfect
plastic berries. I used to sense snow long
before the first
hint of fall, but now I need the calendar,
which I’m loathe
to consult. When my sun-kissed students
ask about winter,
they are always interested in the snow,
not the graceful
shape of deer leaping like ancient tongues of water, but
some days it’s
easier to answer their question instead
of asking them
to let me know of any deer sightings.
Here, the closest
I’ve seen is a water buffalo that perpetually
grazes the hillside
on the road home. We call it a caribou—
I mean, carabao—
in Tagalog, and yesterday I swear I heard
its lumbering shadow
saying, “You chose this,
didn’t you?” and
I could not answer it in fear that I would
feel that harsh
February wind escaping my wide, open mouth, piercing
through its scalp
like deer fleeing from fences
at first glance.
–
Yvanna Vien Tica is a Filipina writer who grew up in Manila and in a Chicagoland suburb. Her work has appeared or is forthcoming in EX/POST Magazine, DIALOGIST, Hobart, and Shenandoah, among others. In her spare time, she can be found enjoying nature and thanking God for another day.