FULL MOON ON TOP OF A CHAMPAGNE PALM'S TIP

a poem for Liz

learn to love the mask
if you still remember that day
when we visited the oldest church
in Laoag
you had seen the facade
of lime and moss and
stones
when you quipped that
ancient is beautiful
that time had a way of putting
value to
those that it left
in silence

time too has
a mask

we just did not
mind

how serenity
covers the
war of the mosses
over a piece
of lime

we are not that
sensitive enough