Sacanle, Kristine Angelica

Zablan, Avigaile

Routine poems of Frank Cimatu: Literary Form and Tradition Analysis

With a careful analysis on Frank Cimatus routine poems we concluded that these poems
follow the tradition of Postmodernism and Modernism.
The followings are the evidences that support our notion the routines follow
Postmodernism Tradition:
The poems correspond to the characteristics of the postmodernism. The poems focused
on the by-products of the modern age at the same time it gave importance to the history of the
World War II. To be able to able to emanate history in the poems, Cimatu used Pugo and Tugo,
whose stories and experiences parodied during the World War II. (Torre n.d.)Also different
interpretations from the readers (reader-response) can be derived. One can be fascism or
plainly about the friendship of Pugo and Tugo and perhaps a lot of meanings and interpretations
can be derived. As a definition of the reader- response theory, the meaning of the story or the
poem per se depends solely upon the readers interpretations/view, may this be feministic,
patriarchal or any lenses in getting a hold of the story.
As one of the characteristics of postmodernism, the poems of Cimatu satisfied the
description of having a loose end. This can be proven by the last routine which is THE SWEET
PEA ROUTINE. The ending seems not to have a tight conclusion. Though the poems made sense
individually or as a whole the last part of the routine doesnt justify in any way the story as a
whole. The routine, instead, had an open end.
The poems follow some of the characteristics of Postmodernism. First is the irony,
playfulness and black humor of the poems. (Torre n.d.)In the poems, Cimatu used the World
War II setting, but instead of discussing the cruelty or madness during that time he focused on
the birth of the Filipino comedians Pugo and Tugo. There is the playfulness in the poemssince
we think that there was a comparison between Pugo and Tugo bashing each and Filipinos being
miserable under the hands of Japanese government (The Numero Routine). In this routine poem,
Cimatu treated WW II humorously and ironically with the use of black humor. Black humor is
humor found in agony, despair or horror. Pugo and Tugo were hilariously morose demonstrating
to the audience the horror of war.
Not that it matters, but you must remember
That Pugo and Tugo used real baseball bats instead of cardboard
To demonstrate to the audience the horror of war.

It was unfortunate that the duo werent awarded
The highest medal of civilians, comedians and the brain-dead.
As no one in the audience
Were aware of the message.
But the war has not really ended
As in some small hours
I still feel a dull throbbing on my head
Which I try to calculate to the letter
And pen in hand, try to decipher
(Cimatu n.d.)

Here we can draw a hypothesis that perhaps the metaphor is that though it was pretty
obvious that Japanese were already causing the Horror of War and the people who wanted to
awaken us never were awarded.
The poem THE END-OF-THE ROAD-ROUTINE also contains a black humor.
Dream dies first. The last three hours
Eng spent alone; Chang, his other half, slackened
Like the murdered body strapped to its murderer
Under the Boxer Codex to make vivid the remorse.
The last moments spent in guilt and terror
Yet wanting his half-brother to be nearer.
Face to face in hope of resuscitation.... (Cimatu, End-of-the-Road Routine n.d.)

In this passage, the horrid description of the moment was used to beautify the supposedly
poignant part of the poem.
The characteristic of the Postmodernism, Pastiche, is also evident in the routine poems of
Cimatu. Routine is generally understood as repetition of that which has already been done but in
this case, memory becomes recollection of the previous genres and styles of literature to create a
new narrative. Cimatu expounds on his poetic process: when you tell me a story, then it
becomes mine after a while. I will have wrested it from you. On the series that he refers to as
the Routine Poems, he adds: The seed of the routine poems started in 1988 when I read an
article in the Sunday Inquirer Magazine about Pugo and Tugo routines (purportedly for the
Bodabil musical which was set for staging at about the same time) and that not one of these
routines can be recalled by the sources. So it became my Eureka! moment. Why not invent
the routines of Tugo and Pugo and make them [mine] somehow? (Subido n.d.)
The routines, however, debunked some of the criticisms on postmodernism which are
its meaninglessness, obscurantism, and formlessness. Each of the routine can stand alone and
have its one meaning. Also, when all the routines are combined they can create a clearer story.
Each of the routines contributed to the smoothness of the sense of the story. The routines are the
different instances of Pugo and Tugos experiences.

The followings are the evidences that support our notion the routines follow Modernism
Tradition:
Another characteristic manifested in the routine poems is the experimentation of the
Modernism tradition. The routine poems abandoned traditional rhyme schemes and wrote in free
verses. We can see from the routine poems of Cimatu the free play of poetic form, Sweet Pea
Routine:
P (juggling the ball): O The Time Is Not For Taking Prisoners
T (jiggling the ball): Kill all above the age of ten
P (jingling the bell): O Lord, our Father, our young patriots
T (jiggling the bell): Idol of our heart, go forth in battle
P (giggling the bull): Be thou near themin spirit
T (gaggling the bull): We also go forth from the sweet peace (Cimatu, Sweet Pea
Routine n.d.)

The poem illustrates how postmodern procedural poems can take on shapes that do not
derive from traditional poetic structures. (Subido n.d.)
Furthermore, the text appears to be highly consistent, this being seen on the repetition of
the element in the left side of the poem. As the poem progresses, the structure becomes more
predictable because of the transformation of the names into verbs (browning the robert, irving
the john, cummings the e.e, etc.). Further into the poem, this play on words progresses into a
punning (sweet peace, sweet peas, sweet pieces). (Subido n.d.)
Another characteristic that has been seen in the routine poems led to the form of narration
called the stream of consciousness, in which the poem resembles the pattern of the human
thought. It can be seen by most of the passages in the poems, for instance:
And Pugo and Tugo leave and the five goes out with them
And just when theyre about to escape, Pow! Light goes out in them
And they goes into this car and later, Pugo wakes up
And he goes moaning, Owww and Tugo like a Bessie Smith blues
And that goes Owww-onlee fo my beheeybee
And one of the detectives goes bashing Pugo and Tugos heads
And he goes, For a friend in Holtville
And the car goes through the woods and stopped
And one goes to Pugo, Can you understand the language?
And Pugo goes dumb, pantomiming that he cant (Cimatu, Holtville Routine n.d.)

And from another observation, the passages from the Holtville Routine mentioned above
in some way mocked the poetic form of Shakespeares Sonnet 66 by the consecutive use of
and as the first word in the lines of the poem.

SONNET 66

Tir'd with all these, for restful death I cry,
As, to behold desert a beggar born,
And needy nothing trimm'd in jollity,
And purest faith unhappily forsworn,
And guilded honour shamefully misplaced,
And maiden virtue rudely strumpeted,
And right perfection wrongfully disgraced,
And strength by limping sway disabled,
And art made tongue-tied by authority,
And folly (doctor-like) controlling skill,
And simple truth miscall'd simplicity,
And captive good attending captain ill:
Tired with all these, from these would I be gone,
Save that, to die, I leave my love alone. (Mabillard 1999)

Another characteristic from the Modern Temper is the symbolism in the poems. As also
mentioned as one of the characteristics in the postmodern tradition, playfulness of the routines
served as the symbolism in the story. The poems seemed to have some hidden meanings inside it.
On first reading we may say that its purely the narration of Pugo and Tugos experiences but
with further analysis, one may suggest that it is about the colonization of our country by the
Japanese. Pugo and Tugo served as the representation of Filipinos who already knows the
horror of war that the Japanese were causing but were unable to deliver the message clearly to
other Filipinos.
To conclude, in all the routine poems, the author speaks of the impossibility of a
nonaligned perception of reality and truth in the impartial, objective sense. It is highly
SUBJECTIVE not INDIVIDUALISTIC according to Charles Bressler, all that is left is
difference. (Torre n.d.) For Cimatus routine poems that follow the Postmodern Tradition, there
is no one correct interpretation of the text. We are all translators, and in this period of
Postmodernism, we all have our own interpretations of text that makes a text successful in letting
the readers come into the picture.
















Bibliography
Cimatu, Frank. "End-of-the-Road Routine." Routine Poems.
Cimatu, Frank. "Holtville Routine." Routine Poems.
Cimatu, Frank. "Sweet Pea Routine." Routine Poems.
Cimatu, Frank. "The Numero Routine." Routine Poems.
Mabillard, Amanda. Shakespeare Online. 1999. http://www.shakespeare-online.com/sonnets/66.html
(accessed March 23, 2014).
Subido, Grace Celeste T. http://www.ep.liu.se/ecp/025/059/ecp072059.pdf (accessed March 23, 2014).
Torre, Frank Jason La. "BLL 111 POSTMODERNISM." Yahoo. https://ph-
mg61.mail.yahoo.com/neo/launch?.rand=f9r188dkrebs4 (accessed March 16, 2014).