MARIA LINDA FELIPE HANIHARA

Posted on Nov. 25, 3:00 p.m.

SUB ROSA: The Crucifix of a Poet and other Poems is a collection of written works by Maria Linda Hanihara, an award-winning creative writer, editor, lawyer, wife and a devoted mother to her special child, Mina Ellen.

Launched recently via online, the poetry book is the author’s open vault containing a compilation of her thoughts, feelings and experiences about her personal life, and more importantly, her journey with her daughter.

First printed in May 2014, Sub Rosa features poems she has written over a span of several years that the poet had kept to herself.  For Linda then, writing was more of a hobby while she pursued other fields of study, but her brilliance with the pen shined through even without the grind.

“Writing has always been her life’s passion. She would write poems everywhere she goes, especially when she’s travelling,” according to Milagros F. Viernes, Linda’s sister.

But admittedly, she was “on a mission to undermine her gift” and never got around to compiling her works to the least- of the many poems scribbled on the pages of her notebooks, pad papers, diaries and others, much less to have it published as a collection. It was only through her sister Milagros F. Viernes’ encouragement that made her come up with a book.

The poetry book offers 125 poems, including the masterpieces that first appeared in Focus magazine, 1976, 1980; Literary Apprentice, 1981-82; Inspirations in Ink, 1992, and Caracoa III, 1983.

“The collection gives a picture of a woman who is intelligent, very emotional and passionate, and very hurt. Frailty and strength mix in her like soda and gin, though her strength is usually a front and takes more force with each betrayal and searing disappointments in her love affairs, whether romantic or otherwise… (Sub Rosa) is interesting for the stuff in it,” wrote Filipino poet Ricardo de Ungria.

Assistant Professor Rosella Torrecampo, one of Linda’s friends, has this to say, “National Artist Francisco Arcellana always said that we can only write about what we know. That is material. But what it is we do to what we know, to turn it into narratives, poetry, drama or any other discourse so far removed from what it is, so these can be what is possible or can be imagined, that is where the magic, akin to omnipotent power that gave rise to creation, gets to be wielded and perfected. Such is the writer’s craft. Such was Linda’s work.”

“SUB ROSA is my offering to appease the past and inspire the future. I recognize the certainties only divine intervention can change. I now embrace tomorrow and accept all the little surprises God has in store for me. I am beginning to really live,” shares Linda and she did live life to the fullest. The second printing of Sub Rosa in June 2017 was dedicated to her passing after she succumbed to breast cancer in 2016.

At a time when social media has become the source of daily buzz and everywhere hype, soulful and poetic people tend to crave for some literary pieces that would speak their minds and feed their inner being; some kind of literary pieces, with old charm just like that of Edgar Allan Poe’s.

 For readers with discerning tastes, the poet has a compilation of unique and classical pieces of poems based on her life’s musings; poems that fire up readers to think deeply of her pains and the angst, and to join in the revelry of her triumphs.

As readers would decipher from her pieces, Linda’s success in life is one wherein the author depicts her loneliness and yearning while caring for her special child. Amidst that, she carried on with her life in gratitude and in God’s grace. Mina Ellen Felipe-Hanihara was born in Chicago, Illinois in 1994. A special child who can not speak or talk, she had her first solo exhibition entitled “LET US BLEND AND BREW, THREE IN ONE FOR KALIKASAN in 2017, sponsored by the Department of Environment and Natural Resources in celebration of the National Disability Prevention and Rehabilitation Week. Featured were 13 beautiful paintings of trees, mountains, flowers and the environment among others. In 2019, she had her 2^nd solo exhibition dubbed “September to Remember” again at the DENR where a total of 13 acrylic painting on canvass were displayed at the Biodiversity Management Bureau, Ninoy Aquino Parks and Wildlife under the leadership of Ms. Julie Gorospe-Ibuan, Chief of the Stakeholders Management and Conflict Resolution Division. Mina’s paintings were also exhibited at the Philippine Consulate in Frankfurt, Germany. The exhibition was titled Art Beyond the Spectrum of a Girl with Autism.

In between chapters, readers will also find some of the artworks of accomplished painter and the poet’s daughter, Mina Ellen.

SUB ROSA is available only in Amazon.  Please click  https://www.amazon.com/Sub-Rosa-Crucifix-Other-Poems-ebook/dp/B09K37YHXW

About the Author:

Maria Linda Felipe-Hanihara finished her Bachelor of Arts, major in English (Cum Laude) and Bachelor of Laws at the University of the Philippines in Diliman. She has an M.A. in International Relations, major in International Politics, from the University of Japan. She attended both the UP Summer Writers Workshop and the Silliman University Writers Workshop in the late 70s. After a brief stint at the Bureau of Internal Revenue and the Office of the Solicitor General, she was based abroad and worked for The Japan Times, a major English daily, as an International Desk and People Page editor and writer/contributor.

Maria Linda Felipe contributed poems to the October 1983 Edition of Caracoa III, the poetry journal of the Philippines Literary Arts Council.

 She was awarded an Accomplishment of Merit for the outstanding literary piece “Flowers” in the book, Inspirations in Ink.