For Those I’ve Saved Names For
For Those I’ve Saved Names For
Each evening home from the paint factory
I spill the coins from my pockets
onto the kitchen table, then
listen carefully as each coin tinks
to the bottom of the mason jar.
I am yet without a wife,
but four large jars filled with copper and silver
wait on the kitchen shelf like children.
I hoard spare change
for those I’ve already saved names for, unborn.
Soberano, sovereign, for lands I might have conquered.
And Luz, meaning light,
a vision at dusk of my young girl, running
ahead of me on the playground,
running straight into a hoop of sun.
My father’s name I hesitate to use,
remembering his comings home
from the orchard to the table,
dirty and bone-tired, a man who believed
his own life poor. Under the naked lightbulb,
he worried how to feed his seven children –
Father, who repeated to convince himself
we are something, we are something,
surrounded by his children, his pockets empty.
This poem by Kenneth Zamora Damacion was first published as a gift of poetry from Pegasus Bookstore, 1998.
…
In 1934 the American government crafted the Tydings-McDuffie Act in response to the rise of anti-Filipino sentiment that was particularly vehement in California and the West Coast. The Act established a 10-year timeline to grant the Philippines independence, freeing America from any sort of mutual relationship or obligations it held with its ward country. Effective immediately that year were changes in Filipina/o status from “nationals” to “aliens,” as well as the enactment of a strict quota that limited Philippine immigration to 50 persons per year. With their nationalities thrice changed from Spanish colonial subjects to American nationals and then independent or alien, Filipinas/os were sent into a spiral of insecurity. After complying with the United States during the Spanish-American War in the understanding of Philippine Independence as the outcome, Filipinas/os were dealt a calamitous betrayal by the institution of American colonial rule. When Filipinas/os adapted to colonial education that promoted American culture and philanthropy, they were gravely deceived by their treatment once among their colonizers in the United States. The unremitting dejection felt by Filipinas and Filipinos had evolved into an unremitting experience that followed Filipinas and Filipinos around the globe. In The Making of Asian America, Lee captures the disappointment described by Pinoy, Manuel Buaken: “For Filipinos who had been raised to learn, recite, and cherish American political beliefs and values, the discrimination they faced in the United States was devastating. 'I was born under the American flag, I had American teachers since I was six,' Manuel Buaken explained to employers who refused to hire Filipinos. 'I am a loyal American,' Buaken protested. 'But no sale.’''
America’s refusal to recognize Filipinas/os as U.S. nationals (beyond an agenda to allow for cross-Pacific travel that would supply cheap agricultural labor) gutted the early hopefuls who had believed America would be a safe and welcoming place. The launch of the Tydings-McDuffie Act and government-sanctioned violence against Pinays and Pinoys decayed confidence in dealings with a seemingly affectionate America. For many Pinays/oys, their best course of action was to self-isolate within their community to protect themselves. Mabalon describes this practice in Little Manila Is in the Heart: “Some Filipinas simply ignored Stockton’s segregation and discriminatory housing practices. ‘If they don’t want you there, why do you have to go there?’ said Paula Daclan, referring to the whites-only hotels and department stores. ‘Stockton is so big.’ She believed racism was of little concern to the Filipina/o community because Filipinas/os had created their world.” The manipulation of Filipina/o nationality over such an extended period had resulted in an inferior quality of life, as well as a loss of identity. Without a confident understanding of Filipina/o existence at home and abroad, the Philippine diaspora struggled to evolve beyond tight confinement.
Well into the “bridge generation” and especially following the Philippines’ significant participation in America’s WWII efforts, Filipinas/os had come to associate themselves with their imposed American identity. Their repeated labor and military contributions toward the agendas of colonial oppressors had underscored Filipina/o efforts to display the strength of their loyalty, dedication, and utility, but to little effect. Inadequate compensation for Filipino veterans fighting for the U.S. was further salted by the Rescission Act of 1946. The act stripped Filipino soldiers of compensation from the American government, in addition to reinstating the message that Filipinas/os would not be incorporated into U.S. society, try as they might. Repeated entreaties from Filipinas/os to the exclusionary United States would set the tone for a perpetually foreign identity amongst Pinays/oys. In the opening essay of Positively No Filipinos Allowed, Antonio T. Tiongson Jr. distills the relationship between isolation and identity within Filipino America:
For many Filipinos today, the phrase “positively no Filipinos allowed,” continues to resonate, a reminder of the anti-Filipino practices and sentiments the manong generation encountered at a particular historical moment in the United States. Displayed prominently on doors of hotels and other business establishments throughout California in the 1920s and 1930s, it was a sign Filipinos frequently encountered in their day-to-day lives symptomatic of their racialization-as nationals and aliens through state-sanctioned practices and policies, and as cheap labor by capital interests and imperatives- that resulted in their disenfranchisement and disempowerment. As a consequence, Filipinos were denied not only public accommodation but also access to rights and entitlements, including citizenship, franchise, and property ownership. In this regard, Positively No Filipinos Allowed lends itself to a reading of Filipino history that evokes the historic exclusion of Filipinos from the U.S. national polity and their location outside the cultural and racial boundaries of the nation.
Manipulation of Filipina/o identity to suit the purposes of American business and government had amplified feelings of incapacity and despair. Positioned as lacking ability as foreign by their colonial overlords, Filipinas/os were meant to understand themselves as unable to be either American or Filipino, as Filipinas/os were also discouraged from practicing their customs as well as from expecting to exercise American rights. The robbery of Pinay and Pinoy agency in concert with contrived narratives regarding stunted aptitudes, bred immobility within the Pinay/oy individual and ultimately silenced the community at large.
Caught somewhere in between two cultures, and accepted by neither, the new generation of Filipino children raised in the early 20th century would struggle to find their place in American society. Mabalon cites this experience through the description of Pinoy, Fred Cordova. “He describes this generation (and himself as a member of this group) as having had “their special way of dressing, dancing, speaking, eating and surviving.” Their search for loopholes into a society that had marginalized their parents was evident in children like my father and his siblings, yet the paranoia of defeat had the effect of mitigating their efforts from the start. Mabalon cites the historian Vicki Ruiz to reference the ways “immigrants and their children pick, borrow, retain and create distinctive cultural forms” and reminds us of how racism and patriarchy “ constrain aspirations, expectations, and decision making.” Members of the bridge generation were distinctly more American than their forebears, yet they remained exasperated by the continued denial of Filipino people into mainstream society. Uniquely positioned as foreigners within as well as outside of their community, Pinays/oys of the bridge generations invited further self-isolation specifically for their ability to better associate with the greater society that strived to avoid Filipino/affluence at all costs. Without robust community support, and in many cases without the backbone of a loving family, members of the bridge generation experienced emotional and political marginalization intimately.
Born to Filipino immigrants in Fairfield, California during the fall of 1954, Papa was a part of the intermediate generation of Filipinos in America. As a young child, he worked alongside his parents on farms owned by the families of classmates and other school members. The Damacion children lived before the American Civil Rights movement and were introduced to an environment that was overtly classist, racist, and sexist. Many of Papa’s foremost memories were laced with his observations of the inequity experienced between his family and others. Observed as often as it was, the practice became a habit that decided the approach to a majority of his actions. By manhood, he would have incorporated a disadvantaged perspective of himself that would manifest in a harassed, tense state of being that was desperate for relief.
The depression that was expressed by my father in “Young Hands, Young Face” at age 7, which transitioned into alcoholism by age 12, became a lifelong obstacle that would hinder his freedom even once he had discovered his creative agency through poetry. As an adult, he would seek the support he had previously lacked through programs such as Alcoholics Anonymous, but he struggled to trust in the care being provided. When we would discuss his journey with sobriety and the progress of his AA meetings, he would mention how difficult it was for him to open up to his “sponsor” and other colleagues. He would say, “These people aren’t my real friends,” before giving them the chance to become so. He’d learned to isolate himself from expectations for care and empathy, even though they had been present in glimpses throughout his life, especially within his ex-wife and daughters. Conditioned at a young age to disregard his personal feelings and happiness for the sake of something greater - -even at the cost of his suffering- - had led to incapacities in treating himself with care and appreciation.
In “For Those I’ve Saved Names For,” Papa articulates the pain many Pinoys experienced at the hands of America’s contradictions. In the poem, he struggles to make sense of the extremes that marginalization has pushed him to. He feels natural pangs of longing for a bright future, while also contending with a conditioned insecurity that cautions him against happiness. At the outset of the poem, he appreciates his potential as a young man who can work hard and earn the ability to cultivate love. Toward the end, his hopes are doused by the memories of his father, a Filipino immigrant who had similar hopes to build a promising life as a young man in America. Instead of promise, Grandpa’s American life had been flushed with lies: land for the free, good-paying jobs, and brotherly love. The lies, as well as the bitterness and disappointment felt by his father, had helped to shape Damacion’s own identity. Even as his world expanded, he remained tangled in a web of inconsistency which prevented him from finding sure footing. Through the contrast of realities presented in “For Those I’ve Saved Names For,” we come to understand the paranoia that ensues from trauma and the immense difficulty it takes to challenge systemic oppression, even in the most granular instances.
In this poem, the longing to experience love and acceptance is expressed, but such desires are also feared. At times loving, tender, and wistful, at other times brooding and resentful, the writing’s contradictions suggest the turbulence felt when attempting to navigate a storm. Strong allusions to a desire for love and the wealth that it will ultimately bring are contrasted with memories of feeling alien and inadequate. Between the two contrasts heavy attention is paid to light, referencing a symbolic aperture into love and out of suffering. How those multifaceted experiences can or should be transmuted into meaningful practice remains unclear, as was true for the poet. Papa would regularly shift between the two poles of light and darkness, settling somewhere in between during fleeting moments throughout his 59 years. His belief in the strength of love, as well as his evident insecurity about how to handle it, is reinforcement for other Pinoys and Pinays attempting the same challenges. He warns of the challenges in cultivating self-love, but we’re also reminded of love’s worthwhile potency.
Chiefly motivating Papa’s belief in love was a longing for change from the misery so many Filipinas/os knew. Above all, he fears becoming like his father, a member of the manong generation that had been desensitized to care despite being surrounded by his loving children:
My father’s name I hesitate to use,
remembering his comings home
from the orchard to the table,
dirty and bone-tired, a man who believed
his own life poor. Under the naked lightbulb,
he worried how to feed his seven children-
Father, who repeated to convince himself
we are something, we are something,
surrounded by his children, his pockets empty.
Papa believes love and misery can coexist, and that knowing one feeling doesn’t prevent a relationship with the other. Care can exist alongside pain, and too much of one can negate the other. The hope is that love will engulf suffering, and not vice versa, but their weary circumstances have made such an accomplishment feel unrealistic. Grandpa must “convince himself” that his family is and does mean “something,” though, in this poem, the main reference or cause seems to be poverty amid racist propaganda and exclusionary regulations promoting the opposite point. To acknowledge the opposite -nothingness- would have meant an admission of his family’s meaningless and an emphasis on anti-Filipino sentiment. The observations of his father and the cautionary tale that they present, are evidence of the intimate complexities that Filipinas/os from the bridge and middle generations confronted.
By modeling incorrect behavior in the presence of love, Grandpa had inadvertently taught his children just how precious love is. At the same time, starvation from love had also placed its powers on a pedestal that Papa felt instinctively undeserving of. Like Grandpa he too becomes preoccupied with notions of getting ahead and finding meaning, though the vehicles differ. For Grandpa, mobility had been a practical matter. Emotional satisfaction was critical for Papa’s vision of success. He too would work tirelessly, going between the paint factory and the kitchen table, with the ultimate goal of affording the ability to appreciate the care he craved. Yet without a wife, he “would hoard spare change for those I’ve already saved names for, unborn.” This is a poem about family as an aspiration but also as a painful memory tied to money never fulfilled. Traumatized by a childhood that was robbed of tenderness and innocence, Papa does his best to anticipate the needs of his imagined family.
Surrounded each night by the four large jars filled with savings, Papa hopes to prevent the oversights of his father. By recognizing the need for love and the means to support it early on, he is optimistic about his family’s future. With a plan in place he dares a life outside of survival. For his potential son, he thinks of the name Soberano or “sovereign.” For his young girl, he envisions a childhood spent on the playground, “running straight into a hoop of sun,” instead of summers spent picking plums from dawn to dusk. Yet as he dreams of their bright futures he is quick to remember his troubled past, suggesting the threats he imagines in opposition to his happiness.
The considerate and responsible intentions revealed in “For Those I’ve Saved Names For,” indicated Damacion’s capabilities, but like his own father, he doubted himself into a space of eventual impassivity. As Grandpa’s tale cautioned Papa, so does Papa’s tale caution us to remember that change can’t happen overnight. The work to create, let alone recreate or redirect an active and consistent force, is achingly ambitious. Papa coupled his intentions with actions to evolve beyond his trauma, which was commendable in itself, but unsuccessful. To truly change takes more than new actions and intentions but also a new system of beliefs. Unable to trust in himself and his worth, he was unable to believe in the love we all deserve. A lack of trust proved the hardest hurdle for him to cross, which is a poignant piece to overcoming struggle.