Philippine Speculative Fiction Read Free

banana thicket, where she had witnessed the strange vanishing the previous
evening. When we come to the exact spot, we see instead a sturdy-looking banana plant standing tall with frightening majesty—curious and familiar at once. We see birds perched and hiding
among the leaves of all the other banana plants, except for this one—and even to us, it seems to emit a peculiar kind of magic. It seems to grow even taller in our eyes. After some time, many
people from the village begin to steal away time from their chores and the ordinary grind to see the banana plant in its unspeakable splendor. It seems to inch with patient increments to the
reaches of sky.
    Soon, at the sight of the new moon, the banana plant begins to blossom, and from its shadows spring a pumping banana heart. That night, by the village bonfire, I temper the tip of one of my
arrows, and with it I begin to write on a slate of fresh bamboo:
    Maayuput,
    We accept the gift of the new pumping banana heart. We wish all of you the bloom of health and the prosperity of harvests even until the moon ceases to shine. May you
     please also extend my sincerest compliments to your village jeweler. Attached to this missive is a modest clay pot filled with orchid seeds.
     
    Magpanabang
     
    As I write, I find that I curl the twists of my
alibata
for some reason, their finish somehow elegant to the eye. That satisfies me greatly. I never usually write like
this. By the second new moon, my bearcat and the hornbill have become good companions. I tie the missive to the hornbill’s leg and strap the clay pot to the bearcat, and together they travel
and play their way through the banana thicket, through the forest, over the rages of the great river, into the village just across the divide.
    OUR CORRESPONDENCE—MAAYAPUT’S and mine—soon grows deeper over many moons.
    Every few days, Makatagad—which is the name of Maayuput’s hornbill—returns to my village with Makahagad, my bearcat, in tow, and with them are exchanges from Maayuput in pieces
of beautiful jewelry, or finely-ground spices in elaborate
abaca
pouches, or cashews and
pili
nuts in hand-carved stoneware. In turn, I send out with the departing hornbill and
bearcat the freshest saltwater catch or pearls or seedlings, all stored in small earthen jars.
    Our villages are soon delighting over the exchanges and the friendship forged across the great river.
    When I write to Maayuput, I sometimes sneak in with my missive a stash of
bulad
—delicious dried fish with the aroma craved by the gods. When Maayuput writes back, I find tumbling
into my hand from its hidden cache in Makatagad’s pouch a spool of handsome hand-spun
piña
.
    Maayuput writes with a sharp tongue, but to my mind, her language spills over to me with stalwart grace. I find it uncommon, and not at all unpleasant. Maayuput writes:
    Thank you for the compliments, and I am, in fact, the jeweler of my village. Your kind words deserve this pair of golden cuffs.
     
    I begin to treasure Maayuput’s gifts. I begin to imagine her, what she looks like. I make her a bow carved from the sturdiest
lauan
, and arrows split with my
sharpest blade. “To aid you in your hunting,” I write. I craft for her several
palayoks
, decorated in intricate geometric patterns. The village people soon tell me that I have
become very generous with my time crafting all these gifts for Maayuput—and I give them the merest shrugs. “It is my time,” I tell them, “and the rest of the world can
always wait.”
    One busy harvest season, Makatagad the hornbill does not join Makahagad the bearcat in the frequent trading of messages and gifts from across the great river. This distresses my bearcat with
unbounded unease, which I find endearing. One evening, I see Makahagad scurrying into the darkness, and after an absence of five days, the bearcat returns with a message from Maayuput, to which I
make my immediate diligent response—which Makahagad soon delivers