Paraisong Kulay Abo

Tomorrow will be our full-length play presented by SPA and by Entablado Filipino. It is the first time such a production (full-length play in Filipino, within Saudi Arabia) has been attempted, and doubtless there have been many disappointments – people not understanding what it is all about, the cost is too expensive, the project is too audacious, some organizational mistakes – but I’m confident that everything will turn out just all right.

My friends wrote a great song for the play (natch, they beat me to it, and all for the better, of course). It matches the mood of the times – the dark sword of war and violence all over in the face of wealth and plenty. I read in the new Human Development Report of the UNDP that a child born in 1840’s England has a better chance of surviving and reaching 30 years old than it is for that same child to be born in modern-day Zambia.

The answer in the midst of all this apathy is that people in the middle MUST be the ones to do something.

We try, we try. But it is all so easy to give up.

PARAISONG KULAY ABO
(Panaghoy ni Lucing)

Lyrics by Agerico Lumitao
Music and Additional Lyrics by Nestor Raphael Valenciano, MD
Inspired by Stevan Javellana’s novel “Without Seeing the Dawn”

Bakit kay ilap ng langit na pangarap?
Ba’t itong puso’y nasasadlak sa hirap?
Hindi kailanman nagkulang manalangin

Bakit ba hapis ang lagi kong kapiling?
Ngiti ng pag-asa’y naglahong lahat giliw
Pati paraiso’y pinatid ng pighati

KODA:
Dati-rati’y ligaya ang kaniig
Dati-rati’y kay liwanag ng paligid
Huni ng mga ibon dulot ay pag-ibig

(Ulitin ang Berso I & II at Koda)

KORO
Ikaw ang bukang liwayway, pinakahihintay
Ikaw na naging sandigan ko, paraiso at langit ko
Subalit wala ang langit sa lupa
At paraiso niya’y, ay paraiso niya;
At paraiso niya’y kulay abo

(Ulitin ang Berso I at Koda)