Noelle Leslie Dela Cruz, Sisyphus on the Penrose Stairs: Meta-Reveries
Dela Cruz’s work and the sundry preoccupations of hers have evolved into some of the strongest contemporary Filipino poetry. Whether it’s Thoreau, St. Anselm, or Monet, each thinker, artist, or philosopher she writes about is given new insight, and a place in modern contemplation. Adept in both the lyrical and narrative forms, Dela Cruz’s range is wide and far-reaching in more ways than one. One reads her work and then is described by her work: “gooseflesh like a field of porcupines huddling in the wind.”
Noelle Leslie dela Cruz teaches philosophy at De La Salle University (Manila), where she received her Ph.D. in philosophy and her MFA in creative writing. She was a poetry fellow in the 47th Silliman National Writers Workshop held in Dumaguete City, Philippines, as well as winner of the First Prize for poetry in the Philippines Free Press Literary Awards. Her poems have appeared in The Philippine Free Press magazine; Kritika Kultura, an international refereed journal of literary, language, and cultural studies; and in the book Under the Storm: An Anthology of Contemporary Philippine Poetry, edited by Khavn de la Cruz and Joel M. Toledo.
Noelle Leslie Dela Cruz, Sisyphus on the Penrose Stairs: Meta-Reveries