“Vengeance Is Not Ours, It’s God’s”

Alms, alms, alms. Spare me a piece of bread. Spare me your mercy.  I am a child so young, so thin, and so ragged.Why are you staring at me?  With my eyes I cannot see but I know that you are all staring at me. Why are you whispering to one another? Why? Do you know my mother? Do you know my father? Did you know me five years ago?

Yes, five years of bitterness have passed. I can still remember the vast happiness mother and I shared with each other. We were very happy indeed.

Suddenly, five loud knocks were heard on the door and a deep silence ensued. Did the cruel Nippon’s discover our peaceful home? Mother ran to Father’s side pleading. “Please, Luis, hide in the cellar, there in the cellar where they cannot find you,” I pulled my father’s arm but he did not move. It seemed as though his feet were glued to the floor.

The door went “bang” and before us five ugly beasts came barging in. “Are you Captain Luis Santos?” roared the ugliest of them all. “Yes,” said my father. “You are under arrest,” said one of the beasts. They pulled father roughly away from us. Father was not given a chance to bid us goodbye.

We followed them mile after mile. We were hungry and thirsty. We saw group of Japanese eating. Oh, how our mouths watered seeing the delicious fruits they were eating,

Then suddenly, we heard a voice call, “Consuelo. . . . Oscar. . . . Consuelo. . . . Oscar. . . . Consuelo. . . . Oscar. . . .” we ran towards the direction of the voice, but it was too late. We saw father hanging on a tree. . . . dead. Oh, it was terrible. He had been badly beaten before he died. . . . and I cried vengeance, vengeance, vengeance! Everything went black. The next thing I knew I was nursing my poor invalid mother.

One day, we heard the church bell ringing “ding-dong, ding-dong!” It was a sign for us to find a shelter in our hide-out, but I could not leave my invalid mother, I tried to show her the way to the hide-out.

Suddenly, bombs started falling; airplanes were roaring overhead, canyons were firing from everywhere. “Boom, boom, boom, boom!” Mother was hit. Her legs were shattered into pieces. I took her gently in my arms and cried, “I’ll have vengeance, vengeance!” “No, Oscar. Vengeance, it’s God’s,” said mother.

But I cried out vengeance. I was like a pent-up volcano. “Vengeance is mine not the Lord’s”. “No, Oscar. Vengeance is not ours, it’s God’s” these were the words from my mother before she died.

Mother was dead and I was blind. Vengeance is not ours? To forgive is divine but vengeance is sweeter.  That was five years ago, five years. . . .

Alms, alms, alms. Spare me a piece of bread. Spare me your mercy. I am a child so young, so thin, and so ragged. Vengeance is not ours, it’s God’s. . . . It’s. . . . God’s. . It’s…

reference: http://www.takdangaralin.com

O Captain My Captain (by Walt Whitman)

O Captain my Captain! our fearful trip is done,
The ship has weathered every rack, the prize we sought is won,
The port is near, the bells I hear, the people all exulting,
While follow eyes the steady keel, the vessel grim and daring;
But O heart! heart! heart!
O the bleeding drops of red,
Where on the deck my Captain lies,
Fallen cold and dead.

O Captain! my Captain! rise up and hear the bells;
Rise up--for you the flag is flung for you the bugle trills,
For you bouquets and ribboned wreaths for you the shores a-crowding,
For you they call, the swaying mass, their eager faces turning;
Here Captain! dear father!
This arm beneath your head!
It is some dream that on the deck,
You've fallen cold and dead.

My Captain does not answer, his lips are pale and still;
My father does not feel my arm, he has no pulse nor will;
The ship is anchored safe and sound, its voyage closed and done;
From fearful trip the victor ship comes in with object won;
Exult O shores, and ring O bells!
But I, with mournful tread,
Walk the deck my Captain lies,
Fallen cold and dead.


http://www.poetry-online.org

declamation (i am a filipino) by Carlos P. Romulo

I am a Filipino, inheritor of a glorious past, hostage to the uncertain future. As such, I must prove equal to a two-fold task -- the task of meeting my responsibility to the past, and the task of performing my obligation to the future.

I am sprung from a hardy race, child of many generations removed of ancient Malayan pioneers. Across the centuries the memory comes rushing back to me: of brown-skinned men putting out to sea in ships that were as frail as their hearts were stout. Over the sea I see them come, borne upon the billowing wave and the whistling wind, carried upon a mighty swell of hope -- hope in the free abundance of the new land that was to be their home and their children's forever.

This is the land they sought and found. Every inch of the shore that their eyes first set upon, every hill and mountain that beckoned to them with a green-and-purple invitation; every mile of rolling plain that their view encompassed, every river and lake that promised a plentiful living and the fruitfulness of commerce, is hallowed spot to me.

By the strength of their hearts and hands, by every right of law -- human and divine -- this land and all the appurtenances thereto -- the black and fertile soil, the seas and lakes and rivers teeming with fish, the forests with their inexhaustible wealth in wildlife and timber, the mountains with their bowels swollen with minerals -- the whole of this rich and happy land has been, for centuries without number, the land of my fathers. This land I received in trust from them and in trust will I pass it on my children, and so on until this world is no more.

I am a Filipino. In my blood runs the immortal seed of heroes -- seed that flowered down the centuries in deeds of courage and defiance. In my veins yet pulses the same hot blood that sent Lapu-Lapu to battle against the first invader of this land, that nerved Lakandula to combat the alien foe, that drove Diego Silang and Dagohoy into rebellion against the foreign oppressor.

That seed is immortal. It is the self-same seed that flowered in the heart of Jose Rizal that morning in Bagumbayan when a volley of shots put an end to all that was mortal of him and made his spirit deathless forever; the same that flowered in the hearts of Bonifacio in Balintawak, of Gregorio del Pilar at Tirad Pass, of Antonio Luna at Calumpit; that bloomed in flowers of frustration in the sad heart of Emilio Aguinaldo at Palanan, and yet burst forth royally again in the proud heart of Manuel L. Quezon when he stood at last on the threshold of ancient Malacañang Palace, in the symbolic act of possession and racial vindication.

Read more: http://wiki.answers.com/Q/Declamation_pieces_about_love#ixzz1Wwl1gpdg