A 

myth is a story that was made up by people who wanted to explain how or why our
world works, how it came to be, how we should treat each other’s, why hurricanes
happen, and so on. 
Myths were sort of like our ancient ancestors’ version of science. Myths explained
how natural events occurred and are set in really ancient times; before history even
began. These myths are generally passed on from parents to kids, and when those kids
grew up to be parents, they would tell their kids, and so on. The word “Myth” actually
comes from the Greek word “mythos” meaning “word of mouth.” 
Myths were shared by groups of people all throughout the world and became a really
big part of their community. Greek mythology is one of the most popular examples of
this. Their myths generally centered around various gods and goddesses. Sometimes
days were even set apart to have big celebrations because of these myths. 

Legends! Legends are stories that people made up as well. However, legends are
about real life people and what they did. Legends always have an important purpose,
but the facts are always a little exaggerated to make them more interesting and
exciting! Generally, some of the facts are dramatically altered and the person the
legend is about never really did what the story says. 

The Story of Tunkung Langit and

Alunsina  
(a folklore from Panay)
Once upon a time when the earth was but a shapeless, formless void appeared the god called
Tungkung Langit (“Pillar of Heaven”) and the virgin goddess of the eastern skies, Alunsina (“The
Unmarried One”). 

The old Visayan folklore states that Tungkung Langit fell in love with Alunsina. After he had
courted her for many years, they married and made their home in the highest part of heaven.
There the water was always warm and the breeze was forever cool, not a bad weather was in
sight, and the couple was happy. In this place in the heavens, order and regularity began.

Tungkung Langit was a loving, hard-working god. He wanted to impose order over the confused
world. He decided to arrange the world so that the heavenly bodies would move regularly. On
the other hand, Alunsina was a lazy, jealous, selfish goddess. She sat at the window of their
home all day doing nothing but brush her long beautiful hair. Sometimes she would leave her
home, sit down by a pool near the door, and comb her long, jet-black hair all day long.
One day Tungkung Langit told his wife that he would be away for some time. He said he must
make time go on smoothly and arrange everything in the world and did not return for a long
time. Alunsina thought he was off to see a lover, so she summoned the breeze to spy on
Tungkung Langit. Tungkung Langit caught the spying breeze and he became very angry with
Alunsina. After he returned home, he told her that it was ungodly of her to be jealous since there
were no other gods in the world except the two of them. 

Alunsina resented this reproach, and they quarreled all day. In his anger, Tungkung Langit
drove his wife away. And with that, Alunsina suddenly disappeared, without a word or a trace to
where she went. A few days passed, Tungkung Langit felt very lonely and longed for his wife.
He realized that he should not have lost his temper. But it was too late, Alunsina is gone.  Their
home which was once vibrant with Alunsina's sweet voice, his home became cold and desolate.
In the morning when he woke up, he would find himself alone. In the afternoon when he came
home, he would feel loneliness creeping deep within him.

For months Tungkung Langit lived in utter desolation. Try as he did he could not find Alunsina.
And so in his desperation, he decided to do something to forget his sorrow and win back his
wife’s favor. So he came down to earth and planted trees and flowers that she may notice it, but
she still didn’t come home. Then in desperation, he took his wife's jewels and scattered them in
the sky. He hoped that when Alunsina should see them she might be induced to return home. 
Alunsina's necklace became the stars, her comb the moon, and her crown the sun. But in spite
of all his efforts, Alunsina did not return home. Until now, as the story goes, Tungkung Langit
lives alone in his palace in the skies and sometimes, he would cry out for Alunsina and his tears
would fall down upon the earth as rain and his loud voice, calling out for his wife, was believed
to be the thunder during storms, begging for her to come back to their heavenly palace once
more.

Who the heck are Tungkung Langit and Alunsina?

I received an interesting question from someone the other day. “Good day!  I’m a bit confused,  the
first generation Visayan gods to third generation gods are from the Visayan Creation Stories  – which are
Kaptan, Maguayan, Lihangin, Lidagat etc. Then there’s Tungkung Langit and Alunsina, so, there are other
Visayan Creation Myths?”
The answer is yes! As with everything in Philippine Mythology, the explanation is rooted in a
confusing and complex history.  Much of what we know today about ancient Visayan Beliefs is due to
Spanish documentation. Miguel de Loarca was one of the first Spanish conquistadors to arrive in
the Philippines and was the author of Relacion de las Yslas Filipinas.  This is one of the main texts
used to piece together pre-Spanish Beliefs.  The familiar Visayan Creation story with  Kaptan and
Maguayan was documented by John Maurice Miller in Philippine Folklore Stories(Boston: Ginn and
Company, 1904).  It wasn’t until 1955, when Filipino anthropologist F. Landa Jocano became
interested in native folklore and travelled the hinterlands of his home island of Panay (collecting folk
songs, stories, and riddles) that we learned of the creation story involving Tungkung
Langit and Alunsina.

The tragedy in this is that there are probably many societies throughout the Visayas that had their
own variation of the creation story that has simply been lost to time – or perhaps waiting to be
discovered.  Many blame the Spanish for the disappearance of ancient beliefs, but then must also
use the Spanish documentation to understand it.  Not unlike the Aztec and Inca civilizations  – that
once flourished in Central and South America – we know that Spanish explorers precipitated their
destruction.  However, it is also through the Spanish documentation that those belief systems have
been pieced together to create a cultural pride and ethnic identity.
The beauty of the Tungkung Langit and Alunsina creation story is that it was documented by a
Filipino anthropologist wanting to better understand his culture.  More so that the story, along with
the Hinilawod Epic, survived Spanish colonization and Catholicism, yet shows ties to other cultural
influences.  This is important because it gives us an idea of how pre-Spanish Animism, Indianized
beliefs, and Islam spread through the relatively peaceful manner of migration and trade.  Sure there
was war, but it was never about imposing beliefs.
Tungkung Langit and Alunsina?
TUNGKUNG LANNGIT:  A popular deity of the Suludnon people of Panay.  He is their version of
the ‘creator’ who made the world out of primordial chaos. In other Visayan pantheons,  Tungkung
Langit was a lesser deity and brother of Panlinugon, god of earthquakes.
ALUNSINA: A prominent goddess in the Suludnon people’s Pantheon of Gods. Alunsina, also called
“Laon-Sina” is considered to be  the ‘virgin goddess’ of the eastern skies and the wife of Tungkung
Langit (“Pillar of Heaven”). In a Panay version of the Creation Myth Alunsina’s name has been
translated as the “Unmarried One”, “The One from Foreign skies” and “ One who is Foreign”.  
Alunsina also appears in the Hinilawod Epic.

https://www.aswangproject.com/tungkung-langit-alunsina/

TO THE FLOWERS OF HEIDELBERG

Go to my country, go foreign flowers,
Planted by the traveler on his way,
And there beneath that sky of blue
That over my beloved towers,
Speak for this traveler to say
What faith in his homeland he breathes to you.

(Rizal in this paragraph poetically requests the flowers of Heidelberg to speak

of him in the Philippines)

Go and say.... Say that when the dawn

First brew your calyx open there
Beside the River Necker chill,
You saw him standing by you, very still,
Reflecting on the primrose flush you wear.

Say that when the morning light

Her toll of perfume from you wrung,
While playfully she whispered, "How I love you!"
He too murmured here above you
Tender love songs in his native tongue.

That when the rising sun the height

Of Koenigsthul in early morn first spies,
 And with its tepid light
Is pouring life in valley, wood, and grove,
He greets the sun as it begins to rise,
Which in his native land is blazing straight above.

(These three paragraphs mentions the times of day starting from dawn and
the break of sunlight. He beautifully asked the flowers to bear witness to his
undying concern for his motherland when at dawn he sings to the flowers native
songs in exchange of their gift of natural perfume. And in the morning under the
soft light of the early sun he reflects still of his motherland where the same sun
now is at its highest... as if he is connected with his motherland through the sun)

And tell them of that day he staid

And plucked you from the border of the path,
Amid the ruins of the feudal castle,
By the River Neckar, and in the sylvan shade,

Tell them what he told you

As tenderly he took
Your pliant leaves and pressed them in a book,
Where now its well-worn pages close enfold you.

(Rizal poetically describes his plan for the flowers to carry his message to
his motherland. He plucks them and preserves them in his book)

Carry, carry, flowers of Rhine,

Love to every love of mine,
Peace to my country and her fertile loam,
Virtue to her women, courage to her men,
Salute those darling ones again,
Who formed the sacred circle of our home.

(His first message to the country is peace, virtue to women, courage to

men)

And when you reach that shore,

Each kiss I press upon you now,
 Deposit on the pinions of the wind,
And those I love and honor and adore
Will feel my kisses carried to their brow.

(He poetically describes his will that his kisses on the flower may be
carried by the wind to his loved ones)

Ah, flowers, you may fare through,

Conserving still, perhaps, your native hue;
Yet, far from Fatherland, heroic loam
To which you owe your life,
The perfume will be gone from you;
For aroma is your soul; it cannot roam
Beyond the skies which saw it born, nor e'er forget.

(Here is the paradox: Rizal used the flowers of Heidelberg as his symbol of
his love for his motherland. The beauty of the flowers is comparable to the way
he looks at our country that anyone who will see the flower may get in touch with
Rizal's concern for his motherland. Though noble this may seem to be, Rizal in
the last stanza reflected on its utter futility since the flower will no longer be the
same when it reaches the country. Its beauty and perfume, which should reflect
Rizal's intentions for the country, will long be gone. Why? For it is far from its
fatherland.)

Rizal wrote this when he was at Germany. In France and Germany, Rizal
was well known and respected. But he may have realized what good will their
respect do to his country. What good will this do to the Philippines if he is serving
foreign lands and not his own. His verses had a single symbol--The flowers of
Heidelberg. But it symbolizes two realities. First, the flowers' beauty
symbolizes Rizal's love for his country, and second, the flowers' reduced
quality refers to Rizal's useless presence in another country. Later he
decided to return to the country despite repeated warning from his friends and
relatives.

"We, therefore, profess, gentlemen, once again unity and solidarity among us. The good and welfare of
our country is our motive. Let us prove to the whole world that when a Filipino wills something he can
always do it."  (Rizal's Speech Delivered at Café Habanero, 31 December 1891)
"Men are born equal, naked and without chains. They were not created by God to be enslaved, neither
were they endowed with intelligence in order to be misled, nor adorned with reason to be fooled by
others. It is not pride to refuse to worship a fellow man, to enlighten the mind, and to reason out
everything. The arrogant one is he who wants to be worshipped, who misleads others, and who wants
his will to prevail over reason and justice." (Message to the Women of Malolos - Europe, February
1889)

“Within a few centuries, when humanity has become redeemed and enlightened, when there are no
races, when all peoples are free, when there are neither tyrants nor slaves, colonies nor mother
countries, when justice rules and man is a citizen of the world, the pursuit of science alone will remain,
the word patriotism will be equivalent to fanaticism, and he who prides himself on patriotic ideas will
doubtless be isolated as a dangerous disease, as a menace to the social order.” (El Filibusterismo,
Chapter 7)

"Uprisings and revolutions have always occurred in countries tyrannized over, in countries where
human hearts have been forced to remain silent." ~ (The Philippines a Century Hence)

“We want the happiness of the  Philippines, but we want to obtain it through noble and just means. If I
have to commit villainy to make her happy, I would refuse to do so, because I am sure that what is built
on sand sooner or later would tumble down.”  (Letter to Blumentritt, 31 January 1887)

http://laonlaan.blogspot.com/2010/02/to-flowers-of-heidelberg.html

To the Flowers of Heidelberg

Go to my country, go, O foreign flowers, 
sown by the traveler along the road, 
and under that blue heaven 
that watches over my loved ones, 
recount the devotion 
the pilgrim nurses for his native sod! 

Go and say, say that when dawn 

opened your chalices for the first time 
beside the icy Neckar, 
you saw him silent beside you, 
thinking of her constant vernal clime. 

Say that when dawn 

which steals your aroma 
was whispering playful love songs to your young 
sweet petals, he, too, murmured 
canticles of love in his native tongue; 
that in the morning when the sun first traces 
the topmost peak of Koenigssthul in gold 
and with a mild warmth raises 
to life again the valley, the glade, the forest, 
he hails that sun, still in its dawning, 
that in his country in full zenith blazes. 
And tell of that day 
when he collected you along the way 
among the ruins of a feudal castle, 
on the banks of the Neckar, or in a forest nook. 
Recount the words he said 
as, with great care, 
between the pages of a worn-out book 
he pressed the flexible petals that he took. 

Carry, carry, O flowers, 

my love to my loved ones, 
peace to my country and its fecund loam, 
faith to its men and virtue to its women, 
health to the gracious beings 
that dwell within the sacred paternal home. 

When you reach that shore, 

deposit the kiss I gave you 
on the wings of the wind above 
that with the wind it may rove 
and I may kiss all that I worship, honor and love! 

But O you will arrive there, flowers, 

and you will keep perhaps your vivid hues; 
but far from your native heroic earth 
to which you owe your life and worth, 
your fragrances you will lose! 
For fragrance is a spirit that never can forsake 
and never forgets the sky that saw its birth.

https://allpoetry.com/To-the-Flowers-of-Heidelberg

Day on the Farm

(Luis G. Dato)
I’ve found you fruits of sweetest taste and found you
Bunches of duhat growing by the hill,
I’ve bound your arms and hair with vine and bound you
With rare wildflowers but you are crying still.

I’ve brought you all the forest ferns and brought you
Wrapped in green leaves cicadas singing sweet,
I’ve caught you in my arms an hour and taught you
Love’s secret where the mountain spirits meet.

Your smiles have died and there is no replying

To all endearment and my gifts are vain;
Come with me, love, you are too old for crying,
The church bells ring and I hear drops of rain.
The March of Death
By Bienvenido N. Santos

Were you one of them, my brother

Whom they marched under the April sun
And flogged to bleeding along the roads we knew and loved?

March, my brother, march!

The springs are clear beyond the road
There is rest at the foot of the hill.

We were young together,

So very young and unafraid;
Walked those roads, dusty in the summer sun,
Brown pools and mud in the December rains;
We ran barefoot along the beaten tracks in the canefields
Planted corn after the harvest months.

Here, too, we fought and loved

Shared our dreams of a better place
Beyond those winding trails.

March, my brother march!

The springs are clear beyond the road
There is rest at the foot of the hill.

We knew those roads by heart

Told places in the dark
By the fragrance of garden hedge
In front of uncle’s house;
The clatter of wooden shoes on the bamboo bridge,
The peculiar rustling of bamboo groves
Beside the house where Celia lived.

Did you look through the blood in your eyes

For Celia sitting by the window,
As thousands upon thousands of you
Walked and died on the burning road?

If you died among the hundreds by the roadside

It should have been by the bamboo groves
With the peculiar rustling in the midnight.

No, you have not died; you cannot die;

I have felt your prayer touch my heart
As I walked along the crowded streets of America.
And we would walk those roads again one April morn,
Listen to the sound of working men
Dragging tree trunks from the forests,
Rebuilding homes- laughing again-
Sowing the field with grain, fearless of death
From cloudless skies.

You would be silent, remembering

The many young bodies that lay mangled by the roadside;
The agony and the moaning and the silent tears,
The grin of yellow men, their bloodstained blades opaque in the sun;

I would be silent, too, having nothing to say.

What matters if the winters were bitter cold
And loneliness stalked my footsteps on the snow?

March, my brother, march!

The springs are clear beyond the road
Rest, at the foot of the hill.

And we would walk those roads again on April morn

Hand in hand like pilgrims marching
Towards the church on the hillside,
Only a little nipa house beside the bamboo groves
With the peculiar rustling in the midnight
Or maybe I would walk them yet,
Remembering... remembering

REACTION ESSAY ON THE MARCH OF DEATH (JAPANESE OCCUPATION)

            The Bataan Death March was the forced march of American and Filipino prisoners of war by the
Japanese during World War II. The 63-mile march began with 72,000 * prisoners from the southern end of the
Bataan Peninsula in the Philippines on April 9, 1942. The horrible conditions and harsh treatment of the
prisoners during the Bataan Death March resulted in an estimated 7,000 to 10,000 deaths.

            The Bataan death march, shows how Filipinos are hopeless and powerless in the said era, they were
treated drastically and disrespected, Japanese from those time would best fit if a demon would be described,
death march is A brutal, barbaric journey through malnutrition, disease, torture, and death. Documentaries try
to explain the history of these horrible events, but only those who survived the march actually know how awful
and cruel it really was. Filipino and American soldiers were treated like puppets worse treated like animals and
even made them drink water from swamps, giving them a little food or some nothing to eat, death march is a
literally a march for your own death as if you were like attending your own funeral, like a lily on a drought
season, you know you will no longer live but the question would always be when will that time come?

            After reading about the Bataan Death March, I think I can honestly say that no one in the time period
had a heart. I know cruel actions take place around the world today but not like what happened during the time
of World War II, well for the reasons. The reasons that people were treated cruelly were a bit absurd. During
this time period it was mostly the Japanese soldiers that didn’t have a heart and were mean to everyone. It's
already scary enough to be a POW let alone having other soldiers starve to death, beat to death and worked to
death.

http://olivernard.blogspot.com

THE MARCH OF DEATH by Bienvenido

N. Santos

Bienvenido N. Santos March 22, 1911 – January 7, 1996 was a Filipino-American fiction, poetry
and nonfiction writer. He was born and raised in Tondo, Manila. His family roots are originally from Lubao,
Pampanga, Philippines. He lived in the United States for many years where he is widely credited as a
pioneering Asian-American writer.

         The Bataan Death march Which Began on April 9, 1942 was the forcible transfer by the imperial
Japanese army of Filipino and American Prisoners of war after the three-month Battle of Bataan in the
Philippines during World War II. The march went from Mariveles, Bataan to San Fernando Pampanga.
The march of death written by Bienvenido N. Santos. The character portrayed by the writer was a Filipino
who sympathized with the brothers we lost during the Japanese Occupation.The two contrasting moods
created by the poem is melancholy and excitement are the contrasting moods created by this poem. The
speaker of the poem is Bienvenido N. Santos. He might be anywhere but Bataan. In the following
phrases, he was just remembering the past with his brother: along the roads we knew and loved, walk
those roads, dusty in the summer sun, we knew those roads by heart, and we would walk those roads
again one April mornings

Referring the death march on Bataan road 1st stanza: were you one of them my, brother whom
they marched under the April sun and flogged to bleeding along the roads we knew and loved? 10th
stanza: You would be silent, remembering the many young bodies that lay mangled by the roadside, The
agony and the moaning and the silent tears, the grin of yellow men their blood-stained blades opaque in
the sun. The purpose of refrain is to evoke people’s minds to remember the honorable soldiers who died
at the death march. The refrain also tells about everything happen in the past and we will always be
remembered in our memories.

              We feel sad and upset after reading the poem. The Japanese did to our fellow Filipino is very
brutal and to kill Filipino is very easy to them in that era. While we read it we happy that our fellow Filipino
exerted to stay alive in that situation and to start a new beginning after the death march and it is a very
inspiring to every citizen of this country. It is a how life was so cruel to our fellow Filipino during the
Japanese Occupation in our country and how they managed to get through the pain and brutality. Instead
of give up try to live whatever happens just live and start a new beginning a new life like our fellow Filipino
did after the march of death.

http://literaryworksinphilippineliterature.blogspot.com/2016/10/the-march-of-death-by-bienvenido-
n.html

March of Death by Bienvenido Santos is a poem about the death march in Bataan during the time of
Japanese colonization. Bienvenido portrayed sympathy to people who suffered in pain and brutality. This
poem shows how life became cruel to those people who suffered.
The refrain of the poem shows sympathy and motivation. The line “there is rest at the foot of the hill” is
telling the reader that despite of the problem there is a bright future waiting ahead. This poem is so
powerful for the reason that it gives hope to those people. The author seems very good in writing because
even though he is in the other country during the death march, he portrays a character in the poem that
seems to know every detail that happened in Bataan. It struck me emotionally, for every word in the poem
that describes their suffering, the line such as “Did you see through the blood in your eyes, for Celia is
sitting at the window…” is describing the agony they bear. Every soldier was tortured to death, and those
who cannot continue to march were being left alone dying on the roads. Pain and brutality are the only
words that can describe the death march in Bataan.
The war already ceased but the marks it has brought to the victims will never be forgotten. People who
told the stories of the past are the ones who stayed strong during the battle. Nevertheless, those who
sacrifice themselves will always be remembered.
https://csphilippineliterature.wordpress.com/march-of-death-2/

Bamboo is the central image in “Man of Earth,” and seafoam is a central image in “Legend....”  Do these
natural things hold any special significance for Filipinos?  Do they have any widely understood symbolic
meaning or meanings within Filipino culture?

As for my poem, I intended “seafoam” to be an incidental rather than a central image (as you will notice,
while the poem ends with it, nowhere else does it occur). Perhaps it’s not so much seafoam as water that’s
the dominant image here, and as an element the poem associates it with the feminine principle, the goddess
Alunsina (from a myth in the region of Panay, somewhere in the Central Visayas), who ironically causes the
world to be by her very absence. By occasioning creation with her disappearance, she becomes the world’s
own mysterious need to perpetuate itself. Meaning: as the emptiness that holds the universe together, she
is, in effect, life’s bottomless desire for itself. 
Of course, it’s only logical that water is a significant image in Filipino poetry -- the Philippines, being an
archipelago, is practically swimming in it.