katapusang hibik ng pilipinas

The Last Appeal of the Philippines*

Mother, in the east is now risen
the sun of the Filipinos' anger
that for three centuries we suppressed
in the sea of suffering and poverty.**

We, your children, had nothing to shore up
against the terrible storm of suffering,
the Philippines has but one heart,
and you are no longer our Mother.

*Katapusang Hibik ng Pilipinas.

**"Sa dagat ng dusa ng karalitaan" in the original, which is absurd. "Dusa at karalitaan" are the words most frequently used by poets in describing sufferings.

[10]

Other mothers cannot compare with you:
your children's comfort are poverty and sorrows,
when they, in appealing to you, prostrate themselves,
your proferred balm is exceedingly painful.

The Filipinos are bound tightly,*
they but moan when kicked, boxed, and hit with the butt of of the gun,
they are tortured with electric wires, hung like an animal,**
is this, Mother, your love?

You order them imprisoned and thrown into the sea,
to be shot, poisoned to eradicate us,
to us Filipinos is this the decision
of a Mother affectionate to her vassals?

We suffered all this even unto death,
we are almost dead yet you don't stop your punishmen,
so that when you throw us into our graves,
our bones are broken, our flesh smashed.

The Philippines has not received any legacy
of comfort from the Mother, nothing but sufferings;
our suffering continues, patents abound,
new charges and imposts are made.

Various ways of cheating us are devised
at the same time compelling us to give in,
we pay for illumination,
although we do not see even one light.

The land and the house we live in,
the field and farm so wide,
and so also the trees and plants --
to the Spanish priest we pay taxes.

Aside from this, the rest
need not be recited, O Mother Spain,
we follow all this to the last breath,
still, the Filipinos are considered bad.

You, O negligent and malevolent Mother,
we are no longer yours whatever happens,
prepare, then, Mother, the grave
where many dead bodies will find rest.

*In the original, the first word of the line is "Gapuring", which has no meaning. The word must have been Bonifacio's error in spelling, and must have been "Gapusin", which fits with the meaning of the second and third lines.

**We took the liberty at translating "makinahi't" (makinahin at) as "tortured with electric wires". Some of the veterans of the Revolution and many old men and women testified that during that time to be tortured with live electric wires was described as "makinahin".

[11]

In the world today will explode
guns and cannons like lightning,
the terrible storm of blood that will flow
from their bullets in the struggle.

It is no longer necessary that Spain be pitied
by the Filipinos, O traitorous Mother,
it is our glory to die,
it is your glory if you defeat us.

The Philippines bids you farewell, Mother,
Mother, farewell, this one who is suffering,
farewell, farewell, pitiless Mother,
farewell now, the last appeal.