Mahal

Candice Joy Oliva

Don’t you just love a good homograph? 

In Tagalog, “nagmamaharalan” can either mean  

“they’re getting more expensive” or “they are all loving each other”  

Why can’t both be true? 

As we see the price of everything from gas to groceries go up 

And love, the highest price.

How did we get here that we’re all wondering if we can still afford it every day?  

From Pilipinas to Palestina to Turtle Island

 I have a love-hate relationship with drafting letter emails to MPs, MLAs & global leaders. 

Do you think they'd engage with poetic verse? 

If I were a little fiercer, maybe I'd write little love poems to politicians and billionaires.

 But my love is free and measured, so it only feeds change.

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Candice Joy (she/they/siya) is an immigrant settler from Bicol, Philippines to Amiskwaciwâskahikan on Treaty 6. Their poetry joyfully plays and contends with languages towards meaning-making and neuroplasticity. Siya will either transcribe, translate, or transcreate the Tagalog or Bikol words she re-encounters in the excavation of home and kapwa.

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