By HEZRON PIOS

Okay, if you’re so, so funny—
                              why not make a stunt about leaving your office
this instant and never take it back?
               You’ll do a great favor to History books and bayarang midya
                                                              which won’t even dare to revise.
Headlines will set your name in bold below a photo of you crying for real.
               To be honest, I am tired of rolling my eyes every time
                                             I see your face on the screen, giving bad speeches.
I don’t blame you if you think what I’m saying seems incomprehensible
                              but a vacancy in the seat can be considered
                                                                             phenomenal at this moment.
For a year or so, you’ve invented gimmicks not even the false hero buried
               in the Land of Heroes managed to think of. It’s not in the howness of things
                                             if ever you get to be thrown to the nearest dumpster
but the manuscript in which you, and your invisible gun, and your checkered polo
                                                             will be devoid of meaning. It’ll be a best-selling book
               with everyone buying copies for themselves and their children’s children.
You’ll be known as the man who was nothing less of a living joke,
                              the man who promised breathless Change. I’m waiting
                                                                             for the punchline to punch you really hard.
                                                                                                          Let me punch you really hard.

Hezron Pios received a BA degree in Communication from the University of St. La Salle. His poems have appeared in Glucose, Katitikan, The Spectrum, and Yuwana. He dreams of exploring visual arts and building a pop-up library someday. He lives in Bacolod City.