The Spouse by Luis Dato

Rose in her hand, and moist eyes young with weeping,

She stands upon the threshold of her house,
Fragrant with scent that wakens love from sleeping,
She looks far down to where her husband plows.
Her hair disheveled in the night of passion,
Her warm limbs humid with the sacred strife,
What may she know but man and woman fashion
Out of the clay of wrath and sorrowLife?
She holds no joys beyond the days tomorrow,
She finds no worlds beyond her loves embrace;
She looks upon the Form behind the furrow,
Who is her Mind, her Motion, Time and Space.
O somber mystery of eyes unspeaking,
O dark enigma of Lifes love forlorn;
The Sphinx beside the river smiles with seeking
The secret answer since the world was born.

It is basically about the spouse who is unsatisfied with their sex life. in the setting, men ruled over women
and that the women can not complain about it. the point of view of the spouse is that she asks the
question "Where is it? This freedom I am supposed to enjoy?"
*This poem is spoken by a third person. It is about a woman who is not satisfied with her life. She is crying
because after their night of passion, when she woke up her husband is already gone plowing the fields.
Isnt that makes you feel alone? Just when you expect youll see his face the moment you open your eyes
after a passionate night, but you only see a rose a compromise. But she cannot do anything about it. She
is just a woman. And she believe she has no other life but other than this. In the end, it questions: Will
there ever be a change? Will she get the love she deserved?

At first glance, this poem could be in ideal text for feminist lambasting of the existing
patriarchal set-up in Philippine society with the spouse seeming to be under the total
control of the husbands.
In the text, the woman is depicted as the one crying moist eyes young with weeping
the one who has to endure the sex act even if it does not feel right, as the whole
second stanza of the poem seems to clearly suggest, and whose domination by the man
was made complete in the third by the lines She finds no worlds beyond his arms
embrace and the FORM behind the furrow (the husband) who is her mind, her Motion,
Time and Space.
But as Derrida would admonish do not be sucked in by the obvious, a reader must try
to look for what is excluded or repressed in the text and of course, for contradictions in
the ambiguous statements. One could ask Where is the husband in the text?
A case in point is the first phrase that took my attention and made me take a different
look at the meaning of the poem Rose in her hand It certainly does not go with the
moist eyes young with weeping. The rose phrase is really more suitable with the
Fragrant with scent that wakens love from sleeping.
What this interpretation is trying to point out and establish is that, instead of the man
dominating the woman in a patriarchal Filipino setting, it is the Filipino male who is more
dominated by or as the Marxists put it, being oppressed by the opposite sex.
Hogwash, you would say, but the SILENT VOICE rings loud and strong in this poem that
man is also dominated upon or oppressed by the apparent WEAKNESS of a woman.
The rose in her hand and being fragrant with scent that wakens love from sleeping
could be a subtle come-on which can make every man follow every turn of a womans
small finger.
If this device fails to make the man do her will, WEEPING, a sign of weakness, is another
weapon used by a woman to get what she wants. There is no wonder that man is
reduced to an animal plowing the field in stanza one.
Could it be that the real picture in the first stanza is of the man is at work very early in
the field because that is what the woman wants and that she is making sure she gets
what she wants as she looks for down to where her husband plows?
It is also helpful to note the use of the pronoun HER in the threshold ofher house when
it is more appropriate to use their for ownership of the house. The HER could be telling
us who calls the shots in the house of course it is NOT his house.
The second stanza gives us another useful weapon of the woman SEX. Though it may
not especially good (a sacred strife) and she may not be enjoying it, being an act of
wrath and sorrow, it still is a very effective tool in domination of the man. The very real
threat of not getting what he wants when he gets outside de-Kulambo is a old nad
very reliable weapon a woman has the instinct of using any time and all the time.

It is but a simple matter to go back in history or all back on the Holy Books to prove my
point. (But Foucault would surely have a different opinion on this.)
And out of the clay of wrath and sorrow Life is fashioned. Out of the sex act however
offensive it could be especially if it is used only for the manipulation of the man, children
are born.
The children the Life fashioned out of the clay and sorrow by the man and woman
could also be very useful in the domination of the man, especially in the family-centered
society where a child acts as a bond that binds the relationship of the wife and the
husband.
A conscientious spouse, whether a husband or a wife, will think of the children first
before thinking of ending a relationship.
And speaking of relationships, once married, the husband becomes her mind, her
Motion, Time and Space the domination of the man by the woman is FULL and
COMPLETE. The husband is reduced to just a FORM behind the furrow the object of the
full attention from the wife who finds no worlds beyond his arms embrace. The wife who,
because she spends all her time for her husband, herself, demands full attention from
him in return.
The strongest argument on womans domination of man is reserved for last in the
fourth stanza. Here, the ENIGMA of the woman comes to the fore. Man is clueless to the
mystery that is a woman. No one, least of all, the husband, will ever understand the
machinations that goes on behind the unspeaking eyes.
The Sphinx who is herself a riddle and a mysterious devourer of men is an apt symbol
for the woman. As I once read from a sociology book, a woman ceases to be a woman if
she losses her mystery and man is always at a loss comprehending what is totally
woman that MYSTERY is the KEY to DOMINATION.
The common belief that the Filipino family is patriarchal is a myth. It is sociological fact
that in the Philippine situation, especially in the Bicolano culture, the woman has the fina
say in the decisions made in the family.
Politics as cultural domination, exists partially in the consciousness, but most of its
control and power resides in the unconscious.
How can one subvert something one cannot understand? How can a man resist the
domination if he is egged on (nagged) very subtly to do what the woman wants?
This interpretation does not want to sound anti-feminist but the silence on the husbands
part signals the domination, reducing the man to an animal (a form) working in the field.
If the abovementioned argument is not convincing enough, let me go back to the title
why did the author use the neutral word spouse instead of the more feminine wife?
Why is the author trying to be apolitical?
Perhaps, that is the key to the dark enigma of lifes love forlorn, the NEUTRALITY, the
openness in a husband-wife, or shall we say, wife-husband relationship the need to
erase logocentric binary opposition and in place of this is a fusion of personalities into
ONE entity living, breathing, loving in a martial utopia.
It is also noteworthy to add the following lines I took from a poem:

For every woman who is not allowed to work,

There is a man who has to bear the brunt
Of earning for the whole family.

To the Man I Married

Angela Manalang-Gloria
I
You are my earth and all the earth implies:
The gravity that ballasts me in space,
The air I breathe, the land that stills my cries
For food and shelter against devouring days.
You are the earth whose orbit marks my way
And sets my north and south, my east and west,
You are the final, elemented clay
The driven heart must turn to for its rest.
If in your arms that hold me now so near
I lift my keening thoughts to Helicon
As trees long rooted to the earth uprear
Their quickening leaves and flowers to the sun,
You who are earth, O never doubt that I
Need you no less because I need the sky!
II
I can not love you with a love
That outcompares the boundless sea,
For that were false, as no such love
And no such ocean can ever be.
But I can love you with a love
As finite as the wave that dies
And dying holds from crest to crest
The blue of everlasting skies.

Her husband filled up the missing part or pieces in his life. From the very first line, it already implies that he has
everything in the world, because of the man who comes along her way who was her husband. She used the word
earth to pertain to him, this tells us, that her husband means everything to her. We cant live without the earth,
so as the speaker too, because his earth was his husband. He is her earth that gives everything to her in order to
live.

You are the earth whose orbit marks my way, and sets my north and south, my east and west. He was her all
who gave directions to her life, who gave meaning to her life, and the reason why she was still alive.
The line You are the final, elemental clay, the driven heart must turn for its rest., she means that hell be the
last man that she will love for the rest of her life. Shes also determined about the fact that shell be happy with
her husband by her side.
I cannot love you with a love, that outcompares the boundless sea. This doesnt mean that her love for him
was lessen or wasnt real, but because only the Almighty God can love as great and as wide as the ocean.
But I can love you with a love, as finite as the wave that dies, and dying holds from crest to crest, the blue of
everlasting skies. She compares her love to the waves, an everlasting love. For as long as there is an ocean its
waves will never get away from it.