Poems of Carlomar Arcangel Daoana, Mookie Katigbak-Lacuesta & Allan Justo Pastrana

Edited and introduced by Dinah Roma

This eighth volume in Vagabond’s Asia Pacific Poetry Series brings together a selection of poetry from three contemporary Filipino poets Carlomar Arcangel Daoana, Mookie Katigbak-Lacuesta & Allan Justo Pastrana. Edited and introduced by Dinah Roma, with cover art by Mark Andy Garcia.

Dinah Roma writes, “I am certain that in reading the enthralling poems of Carlomar, Mookie, and Allan—whether those readers be in Asia, Europe, North America, or elsewhere—they would find in them a rich evocation of the country and nation that is the Philippines. It is a geography and geographical construct that is as complex and slippery as the many distances traversed in the poems of places by Carlomar, of the intimate sphere that is all at once vulnerable and bracing as that of Mookie’s, and the exacting intellectual ruminations of Allan.

They are our Filipino poets of today, and I am very honored that their voices will resound as they bring Philippine contemporary poetry in English farther afield.”

2015. ISBN 978-1-922181-60-2. 124pp.

Cover image © Mark Andy Garcia, 2014, Be Ye Steadfast. Oil on canvas. Courtesy of the artist and West Gallery, Manila.

Carlomar Arcangel Daoana (b. February 1, 1979) is the author of four collections of poetry: Loose Tongue, Poems: 2001-2013 (UST Publishing House, 2014), Clairvoyance (UST Publishing House, 2011), The Fashionista’s Book of Enlightenment (DBW, 2009) and Marginal Bliss (University of the Philippines Press, 2002). He earned a Bachelor’s degree in Literature at the University of Santo Tomas where he would eventually serve as an Associate for Poetry in its Center for Creative Writing and Literary Studies. In 2012, he won the Grand Prize for English Poetry in the Carlos Palanca Memorial Awards for Literature for his collection, “The Elegant Ghost.” For his art journalism, he was awarded the Purita Kalaw-Ledesma Prize for Art Criticism bestowed by the Ateneo Art Awards in 2014. Currently, he writes a fortnight column in the Arts and Culture section of The Philippine Star, one of the country’s major broadsheets, and is finishing his Master of Fine Arts degree in Creative Writing at the De La Salle University. 

Mookie Katigbak-Lacuesta is the author of two books of poetry, The Proxy Eros (Anvil Publishing, 2008) and Burning Houses (UST Publishing House, 2013). She has won prizes for her work, most recently first place at the Carlos Palanca Memorial Awards in 2014. She is the editor and co-creator of Metro Serye, a fold-out zine featuring new fiction, poetry, and graphic art. She is the wife of fictionist Sarge Lacuesta, and co-producer of Lucas Lacuesta, her best work to date, and ever. 

Allan Justo Pastrana holds a Masters degree in Creative Writing (Poetry) from the University of the Philippines, Diliman. He finished his Bachelors degree at the University of Santo Tomas Conservatory of Music (Music Literature and Piano Performance). He is a two-time Thomasian Poet of the Year and a recipient of the Rector’s Literary Award during his college days. He bagged the Grand Prize in the English Division of the Maningning Miclat Award for Poetry in 2005 and won for the Essay in the 2007 Don Carlos Palanca Memorial Awards. His first book of poems is Body Haul (UST Publishing House, 2011), which won the 2013 Madrigal-Gonzalez Best First Book Award. Pastrana teaches Literature at Miriam College and Music at the Ateneo de Manila University.

Dinah Roma is Professor of Literature and Creative Writing at De La Salle University, Manila where is she also Chair of its Department of Literature. She is the author of three books of poetry: A Feast of Origins (UST 2004), which won the 2004 Philippine National Book Award for Poetry in English, and two other major awards; Geographies of Light (UST 2011), whose core collection won third prize in the Carlos Palanca Award for Poetry in English in 2007, was a finalist in the 2011 Philippine National Book Award for Poetry; and, her most recent collection Naming the Ruins (2014) published by Vagabond Press was launched in Sydney, Singapore, Davao, and Manila.