Rest Not, Rizal, Not Yet by Francisco O. Javines

(as published in the Philippine Journal of Education, December 1963)

Rest not, Rizal, not yet,
Rest not in peace. Your work is not yet done:
The very ailments that your pen described
and dared exposed so all the world could judge
the work of alien tyrants,
are now the very ills that plague our land:
The cancer that is caused by graft and greed
still is the festering sore
in high and low society, and now creeps
like a pestilence over the land.
The ignorance of leaders in your day
still is the ignorance that blinds
the dark and narrow minds
of self-appointed leaders in our midst.
The haughty arrogance of conquerors then
now is the studied arrogance of sycophants,
the gross discourtesy of loafing clerks.
Still money flows to grease and straighten out
the sinuous, circuitous, repetitive course
of administrative actuations.
Rest not, Rizal, be with us yet!
New social cancers blight the land:
the broke home, the child that knows not love or case;
the beggar stretched across a muddy pavement;
the gambler, the dope addict, and the goon;
the greedy legislator, ten percenter,
influence peddler, phony expert, super crook;
the inconsiderate rich who recklessly flaunt
their diamonds, their parties, and their cars;
the impatient poor who shun decent work
and dream of making millions overnight;
the bribed policeman turned extortionist;
the slanted press; the paid indecencies:
the list is a litany of legions.
Rest not, Rizal, be with us yet:
Rebuild in us the beauty and the dream;
Restore in us the vision and the hope;
Remake in us the mansions of the mind;
Reopen for us windows in the soul
through which the winds of vigor-giving change
will blow to sweep away our lassitude,
our lethargy of limb, our languor of the mind;
our longing for the frostrings and the frills.
Thus will return with stronger roots in us
your simple virtues, Pride of our Race,
your strength of soul, your industry, your thrift,
your great nobility, your quiet dignity;
your fortitude that faced the bullets in the dawn,
and sowed a revolution for our rights!

(You might also be interested of the poem They Only Hiked to Heaven by the same author.)