|
|
| TITLE: |
Visions of a Chamoru / tinige', Peter R. Onedera. |
| AUTHOR: |
Onedera, Peter R., 1953- |
| PUBLISHED: |
Agana, Guam (P.O.. box 3096, Agana 96910) : P.R. Onedera, c1995. |
| DESCRIPTION: |
24 p. ; 28 cm. |
| NOTES: |
Cover title. |
| NOTES: |
In this collection of poems, Peter Onedera, Guam's master playwright and storyteller, skillfully mingles the rhythm of two languages to evoke the struggle to hang on to a heritage that keeps threatening to slip away. Writing in both English and Chamoru, in a voice both rueful and angry, Onedera mourns a culture almost lost to the seductions of the modern world, brought on by the Spanish, American, and Japanese conquerors who have occupied the island of Guam in the past 500 years. Onedera wings effortlessly between the losses of the ever present past and the elusiveness of a political future. In "I Stood by The Gravesite of Kepuhua," he plaintively admonishes the Chamoru chieftain who welcomed the Spanish missionaries in the wake of Magellan's discovery of the island: "... I ponder what would have been / if you didn't give our land... / Would the Chamorus still be morus, unclothed, untamed but clean / My chief, my friend Kepuha, you buried my ancient heritage that day." In "Not Good Enough," he captures the essence of Guam's struggle for self determination, writing "And so, 'You are not good enough,' according to the pact,/You know there is not much to be, if it weren't for the organic act." |
| NOTES: |
In English and Chamoru. |
| SUBJECT: |
Guam--Poetry. |
|
Title Information
