Gonzalinho da Costa’s poems will embrace the pages of aaduna’s forthcoming spring 2015 issue with a launch date towards the end of National Poetry Month, which is this month...April! With permission of the poet, we celebrate POETRY with a da Costa poem followed by his brief narrative that will enhance your understanding of an aspect of Filipino culture and tradition. THE RICE PLANT I held him by his slender neck To pierce him under his chin And saw white sap trickle forth Like milk spills from a tin. I shook him strongly by his thigh To feel him flail like a fish And heard his hands’ helpless sigh Like sand shaken in a dish. I bravely bent his youthful bone, Which sprang with a painful cry— I wondered how one so green and wet Should so resemble I— For I am brown and dry. Gonzalinho da Costa shares: Rice is a symbol of Southeast Asia—kindly note, for example, the bound rice sheaf in the ASEAN logo. Malays, who incl...