The Haiyan Dead: Merlie M. Alunan

THE HAIYAN DEAD
Merlie M. Alunan
Leyte
On Merlie M. Alunan and Her
Chronicles of the Storm
• Merlie M. Alunan is one of the most
influential and respected writers in the
Visayas region.
• She experienced Typhoon Haiyan in
Tacloban City, Leyte
• She is professor emeritus at the
University of the Philippines Visayas
• In the weeks after the storm, she released
online the poem “The Haiyan Dead,”
which was subsequently translated into
different Filipino languages.
• Her unique perspective had immediately
located the experience in the Visayan
terrain as one that is badly hit but has the
courage and determination to emerged
from the devastation caused by the storm.
The Haiyan Dead
do not sleep.
They walk our streets
climb stairs of roofless houses
latchless windows blown-off
doors
they are looking for the bed by the
window
cocks crowing at dawn lizards in the
eaves
they are looking for the men
who loved them at night the women
who made them crawl like puppies
to their breasts babes they held in
arms
the boy who climbed trees the Haiyan
dead
are looking in the rubble for the child
they once were the youth they
once were
the bride with flowers in her hair
red-lipped perfumed women
white-haired father gap-toothed
crone
selling peanuts by the church door
the drunk by a street lamp waiting
for his house to come by the girl
dreaming
under the moon the Haiyan dead
are
looking for the moon washed out
in a tumult of water that melted their
bodies
they are looking for their bodies that
once
moved to the dance to play
to the rhythms of love moved
in the simple ways--before wind
lifted sea and smashed it on the
land--
of breath talk words shaping
in their throats lips tongues
the Haiyan dead are looking
for a song they used to love a
poem
a prayer they had raised that sea
had
swallowed before it could be said
the Haiyan dead are looking for
the eyes of God suddenly blinded
in the sudden murk white wind
seething
water salt sand black silt--and
that is why
the Haiyan dead will walk
among us
endlessly sleepless--
Questions
1. Which of the following statements is true
about the persona, who speaks in the third
person:
• He/she addresses the Haiyan dead after the
storm
• He/she catalogues the Haiyan dead after the
storm
• He/she recalls the Haiyan dead after the
storm
ANSWER
He/she addresses the
Haiyan dead after the
storm
2. In the perspective of the persona, what
were each of the Haiyan dead doing? To
plot the dramatic situation in poem,
chart the persons/individuals mentioned
by the persona and the verbs or actions
attributed to them and as in a map,
connect them with the phrase “The
Haiyan Dead” in the middle of the box
ANSWER
Girl
The boy who climbed the trees,
dreaming Looking
Looking in the rubble for the child
under the for their
moon, bodies
Looking for
the moon
washed out The Haiyan Dead
Looking
They will
for a song
walk
they used
Looking for the eyes of God suddenly blinded among us
to love , a
endlessly
poem , a
sleeples
prayer
they had
raised
3.What were the images of
devastation dramatized in
the poem? Write in the
space below the lines that
described the locality after
the storm.
ANSWER
One has to understand and
appreciate what metaphors do to
create significations and insight.
The poem, describe by the
national artist for literature Edith
L. Tiempo as "steeped in
metaphor
4. There were clear references to
what the dead were doing in what
was left of their town after the
typhoon. What do these suggest
about the persona’s attitude
towards the event?
ANSWER
The persona’s attitude

towards the event is that
the victims who perished
during the storm are
zombie-like.
5. Some parts of the poem do
not follow the usual writing
mechanics. How do you relate
this with the persona’s attitude
towards the devastation?
ANSWER
 The persona’s attitude towards the devastation is
to share her experience and to tell everyone how
do people in Tacloban suffer from the typhoon
Haiyan (Bagyong Yolanda). She also wants to
make sure that the person who will read her poem
will have an idea on how the people survive from
the devastation happened.
6. The Haiyan dead, in the
memorializing of the persona,
seems unable to have peace as
they “do not sleep” and keep on
“looking” for certain people,
objects, or places in the town.
How do you relate the two main
actions of the Haiyan dead?
ANSWER
 The victims of the typhoon Haiyan cannot sleep
because of the destruction it caused in their town.
They seem to look for their loss member of the
family and hoping that they survived in the
tragedy, also they seem to find for objects that
they can still use that will help them to start a new
life.
7. Thinking of the poem in
terms of its metaphor, what
was being suggested by the
person’s way of perceiving the
devastation? How is the event
of the calamity related to the
calling out of the Haiyan
ANSWER
 The poem describes the Haiyan Dead as not
sleeping and walking among us endlessly
sleepless. The persona’s way of perceiving the
devastation suggests that some of the people were
not being laid to rest properly and some of them
never found after the severe storm surge. It also
speaks of how the persona want to make sure that
this event will be remembered so it can be
avoided in the future.
ANSWER
The event of the calamity was
related to the calling out of the
Haiyan Dead by describing the
manifestation of the lives lost in
devastation, of how the life in that
locality once thrived before the
storm.

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THE HAIYAN DEAD

The persona’s attitude

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