Dinah Roma is a professor of literature and creative writing at the De La Salle University, Manila. She is the author of two books of poetry, A feast of origins (UST, 2004) and Geographies of light (UST, 2011). She is now at work on her third collection Naming the ruins (Vagabond Press, 2014) which evolved from her research project on travel theory and narratives on Southeast Asia while a Research Fellow at the NUS Asia Research Institute (June 2010–June 2012). She is currently the Chair of the DLSU’s Department of Literature.

'Naming the Ruins'

Toward a Southeast Asian Poetics of Landscape

This exegetic essay surveys the key writings on ruinology, specifically Walter Benjamin’s the allegory as emblem of ruins, which discern aspects of history, form, and memory. I used his work along with Sigmund Freud’s exploration into the unconscious as ‘ruins’ to explore how it may translate as a thematic concern in poetry and as lens to reflect on personal loss. The discussion engages the role of poetry—a language that fathoms fragments and dissonance—in restoring meaning amidst chaos.