THE ARCHIVE OF QUIET THINGS
by Bb. Magi de Leon
I. THE WOMAN WHO LEARNED HER NAME FROM WORK
I was not named in a hospital room.
I was named in the rhythm of labor:
rice rinsed until water learned patience,
laundry beaten into white confession,
hands fluent in exhaustion before language.
My mother called me
an extra pair of hands,
as if love survived
only when useful.
Before I could write my name,
I learned how silence became discipline,
how stillness passed for obedience.
When I finally asked who I was,
the house answered in chores.
II. INVENTORY OF THINGS NEVER SPOKEN AT THE DINNER TABLE
When rice runs low,
the spoons speak first.
Fathers count coins without looking up.
Mothers laugh too quickly
to keep sorrow from sitting down.
We learned that hunger
is not always for food.
Sometimes it is unfinished questions,
truths too costly to serve.
Our family spoke in substitutions:
mamaya na...
okay lang...
tiis lang.
No one teaches this grammar.
You inherit it
until it sounds like love.
III. THE HOUSE THAT REMEMBERS BEFORE I DO
The house remembers
what I try to forget.
It keeps the echo of footsteps,
slammed drawers,
prayers cut mid-breath.
At night it creaks,
correcting my memory:
This is where you learned waiting.
This is where someone left.
This is where you stopped asking why.
Sometimes I am not living here.
I am being archived.
IV. MYTH OF THE WOMAN WHO COULD TURN FATIGUE INTO LIGHT
They say she lived
where women never rested,
only changed form.
She swept until dust resembled gold.
She washed until the river
forgot whose grief it carried.
Her miracle was repetition,
so faithful
it passed for grace.
She never explained her endurance.
Silence became her inheritance:
asking nothing,
taking everything.
V. WHEN THE DAUGHTER LEARNS TO INTERRUPT THE CURSE
One day a daughter will ask
why exhaustion sounds like inheritance.
She will name things plainly:
this is labor,
this is imbalance,
this is love
that forgot gentleness.
She will not break the family with fury,
but with clarity.
For the first time,
the house will hear itself
without suffering as its language.
Ms. Maria Guia G. Lopez de Leon, also known as Bb. Magi de Leon, is a writer and community advocate from the Philippines. Her work explores memory, identity, grief, belonging, and the fragile spaces between what is remembered and what is lost. Writing across poetry and prose, she draws from everyday encounters, Filipino culture, and the complexities of human connection. During the pandemic, she was named a Most Outstanding Volunteer (National Category) by the Philippine National Volunteer Service Coordinating Agency (PNVSCA) for her community work. She continues to write while working in community development and the arts, where much of her writing finds its roots.
