The sea glistened like a field of crushed diamonds, reflecting the soft light of the stars.
Tonight, as in all nights, was her ritual. It was late, the time when dreams fluttered in the minds of others, and it was this time that she could collect her thoughts.
There was little left for her in what should have been her home. Her mother had told her stories of when her people would move as nomads all over the island, but those times were long past. She looked at the beach, now filled with tourists escaping the drudgery of city life. This place was once a paradise for her people to live, now it was a hollow shell of its former self, chipped away at the ends by the consumption of man.
A soft tear made its way down her cheek, and her sorrow reaches its peak. How did it come to this, was this really the destiny of her people? Forever lost, forever wandering for their place in the world?
She closes her eyes and breathes in the night air. She lays her head on the soft sand, letting the thoughts fly through her mind until darkness fills her.
She awakens, rested and ready, yet something is not right.
The stars are not reflected on the sea, she cannot feel the warm glow of moonlight.
Instinctively she knows.
It is early, when her people would tend to the fields and go about the means of their survival, but no, she corrects herself, the old ways are gone.
The darkness fills her vision until nothing is left.
Until the beaches are covered with concrete.
Until the forests are drowned by the mines.
Until her family has to resort to begging.
She knows she has to shout, to make the sun fight back against its victimhood. It is in her blood, the blood of her people.
Yet silence reigns.
“Let the serpent take the sun.” She falls on her knees and her tears fall into the darkness.
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Written by Karl Gaverza
Copyright © Karl Gaverza
Story inspired by the Sawa description in Creatures of Philippine Lower Mythology. Ramos. 1971.
Sawa Illustration by Patricia Zulueta
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