check in: bacolod

BACOLOD CITY--it's the second day of the IYAS workshop, and (i didn't think i'd say this) i'm actually happy to be here. yes, it's my first time in bacolod, and this is the last national writers' workshop i can attend (hmm..maybe they'll still let me into the UST workshop in tagaytay...), my first one in a long while, but i DID have to give up a free trip to go whitewater rafting and canopy walk(ing) in cagayan, and the talaandig tribal wedding in bukidnon, among other things.

what makes this workshop worth all those things i missed is that it's the first time this format is being used. instead of the usual plenary critiquing where everyone discusses a work, with the author revealed at the end, here we've broken up into groups according to language and genre, with a panelist assigned to each group. and we not only discuss our own work but also get inputs and handouts and homework (just as if we were in a graduate class). marj evasco and elsie coscolluela are assigned to our group (english poetry) and there are just four of us fellows in the group.

the downside of this is that we don't get to interact (and get comments) from other fellows and panelists, and don't get exposed to other genres and languages (we also have cebuano, hiligaynon and filipino works here). on the other hand, we get to give our particular craft the focus and intensity it deserves.

writing is really about discipline and passion, something i haven't been giving it, especially in the past few years. maybe God really sent me here to turn me into a serious poet, because writing poetry for me has always been an aside, something i don't do unless absolutely necessary, i.e. when it's a requirement and there's a deadline, or there's something i need to express/ communicate that can only be done through poetry. usually i take the easy way out and just write an essay about it.

poetry takes me at least a day (or the wee hours of the morning) to write; this doesn't include the days (or years) of revision. essays take half a day, including revision. but this workshop is saying that revising poetry needs as much clarity of intention as outlining an essay or a dissertation, aside from precision in sound and image. so we'll see how much i've really learned and resolved to take this discipline to heart once i start revising and writing new poems before saturday, our deadline.

my co-fellows are young, as expected. i'm one of the oldest (not the oldest, thankfully). but again, the six degrees of separation is at work, and not because we move in the same writing circles or come from the same schools or went to the same writers' workshops. there's actually a music and NGO connection. and exes and fiances, too. or just plain amazing coincidence. i really want to write an essay about that.

my FREE internet, by the way, is powered by Globelines WorldPass. it's a new product that's on a trial period now: use the same internet account for your DSL, wi-fi, and dial-up anytime, anywhere in the world. you don't need a globelines phone (although their rates ARE cheaper) to use it. hapi dba?