Ultimo Adiós Behind the Glass

Sang Dangkal na Ultimo Adiós at Ako

April 7 when I went to Rizal Shrine in Fort Santiago to study the place for my shoot in the company of Toto, John Rey and Cristy–family of Manang, our washerwoman. We toured the area and since I had not been to Fort Santiago for quite a time, I came to know that the wax figure of Rizal had been transferred to an inner sanctum of the room you couldn’t properly view it. They moved it because the wax has started to melt. It seemed useless to look at it from afar. It was in my storyboard the way I remembered it placed somewhere on the ground floor area. I had to forcibly erase that from my board. I asked for the room where the 14-stanza poem Ultimo Adiós is displayed. On the second floor, in a big room guarded by a male receptionist can be found displayed behind glass a copy [I guess] of the original Ultimo Adiós, the last poem written by Dr. Rizal found inside the oil lamp [displayed with the untitled poem] where he kept it. It must be noted that the poem could not have been written on December 29, the night before his death by firing squad because the oil lamp with the poem was handed to his family in the afternoon of Dec. 29. It must have been written after the death verdict on him.

Recto-Verso of the Untitled Last Poem of Dr. Jose Rizal

 

Entrance to Fort Santiago, one of the oldest Hispanic stone fortresses in the the Philippines; former "kuta" or fort of Rajah Soliman; MM with JohnRey, photo shot by Toto

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