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(Philippine Literature)
The Secret Language
by Maria Luisa B. Aguilar-Carino

I have learned your speech,
Fair stranger; for you
I have oiled my hair
And coiled it tight
Into a braid as thick
And beautiful as the serpent
In your story of Eden.

For you, I have covered
My breasts and hidden,
Among the folds of my surrendered
Inheritance, the beads
I have worn since girlhood.

It is fifty years now
Since the day my father
Took me to the school in Bua,
A headman's terrified
Peace-gift.  In the doorway,
The teacher stood, her hair
The bleached color of corn,
Watching with bird-eyes.

Now, I am Christina.
I am told I can make lace
Fine enough to lay upon the altar
Of a cathedral in Europe.
But this is a place
That I will never see.
 
I cook for tourists at an inn;
They praise my lemon pie
And my English, which they say
Is faultless.  I smile
And look past the window,
Imagining father's and grandfather's cattle
Grazing by the smoke trees.
But it is evening, and these
Are ghosts.

In the night,
When I am alone at last,
I lie uncorseted
Upon the iron bed,
Composing my lost beads
Over my chest, dreaming back
Each flecked and opalescent
Color, crooning the names,
Along with mine:
Binaay, Binaay.

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