Visiting a parish in the Philippines, I find myself in the heart of the carving industry of the country, in a small village by a lake. The church is adorned with garish religious artefacts; the community hums as festival processions move up and down. But as I visit a woodcarver parishioner, amongst the half-finished or broken pieces on the shelf, I chance upon a deeper reality….
MARY COBWEB QUEEN
High on a dust-laden shelf
And covered in cobwebs,
Perilously leaning as if to ensure
The job below is cut to perfection,
Sits Mary, mother of shadows,
A not quite finished Queen of Heaven.
Here in Paete, Laguna,
Some hours to the south of Manila,
She dwells in a woodcarver’s basement,
Her home among the offcut shavings of
A carpenter’s shop, a familiar place:
Among the forgotten; where she belongs.
Quietly she watches as hand and eye
In perfect synergy with blade and wood
Now ply their craft, of long-learned
Generations: she the mother of the one
Whose destiny was shaped in wood;
She whose heart was broken by a tree.
Throughout the town the saints are
On parade: perspiring bands blast,
Children run behind the carnival,
While townsfolk shuffle to
The memories of aeon-chiselled truths
Now long assigned to tribal fantasy.
But Mary, shrouded in the dust of
Decades, bides her time, and as in
Years gone by, she stays at home.
Hers to weep at this abuse of icons;
Hers to ponder hope and desolation both,
Within her sacred, bleeding, wooden heart.
Paete, Laguna, Philippines,
March 2012
