Beside a spacious beach of fine and delicate sand / and at the foot of a mountain greener than a leaf, I found in my land a refuge under a pleasant orchard; / and in its shadowy forests, serene tranquility, / repose to my intellect and silence to my grief.

– José Rizal, “Mi Retiro”

RETIRO is a street in Quezon City, now renamed N.S. Amoranto. In English, it literally means “Retreat.” But whose retreat are we talking about? The clue lies in what streets are near Retiro: Crisostomo, Dapitan, Dimas-Alang, Elias, Ibarra, Isagani, Josefina, Laong Laang, Leonor Rivera, Makamisa, Maria Clara, P. Florentino, San Diego, Simoun, Sisa, Tasio and Capitan Tiago. These names are related in one way or another to the life of José Rizal because, in 1913, a subdivision was developed at the Sulucan Estate in Sampaloc named Rizal Park (like Grace Park in Caloocan, before Rizal Park became Luneta’s new name). Hence, Retiro refers to one of Rizal’s longest poems, “Mi Retiro” (“My Retreat”).

José Rizal was a cosmopolitan, so used to being involved in politics and in the world. He was among the first Filipinos who became well-traveled and hobnobbed with the great intellectuals of Europe. But after years of campaigning in vain for the Spanish colonizers to grant liberal reforms and civil rights to the Filipinos, he decided to come home in 1892 to organize La Liga Filipina so he could help build the nation and face his destiny. He knew his life was in danger and prepared to be executed.

But the Spaniards had other plans. They exiled him to Dapitan, Zamboanga del Norte, the edge of the colony. They wanted him to be bored and surrender his will to the whims of the colonizers. Yet, he did what he could to give life to the town. He became a one-man NGO that introduced, as Floro Quibyen noted, progressive education, social entrepreneurship and community development.

In August 1893, his mother, Doña Teodora Alonso and his sister Maria joined him to live in Dapitan. He treated his mother’s eyesight, and she was able to observe how busier he had actually become. Before she left to return

to Manila in February 1895, she requested and encouraged her son to write poetry again.

But it would take some time before he could fulfill her wish. Filomeno Acopiado, one of his pupils in Dapitan, remembered that the roof of his nipa hut leaked one day when it rained just minutes after Rizal lay down as he tried to rest after working himself like a dog and feeling sick. Rizal called some of his students to climb his roof for him and put some nipa leaves to stop the leak. When Rizal recovered, Acopiado said he was inspired to write about his house, how he lived there, and how it had become home, his retreat.

On Oct. 22, 1895, Rizal sent the poem to his mother. “My Retreat” is arguably Rizal’s longest poem, apart from his lyrical plays. A copy of the poem that Rizal himself had sent to the Pardo de Taveras will be auctioned at the León Gallery on December 2.

Reading it, some might feel that the verses — 24 stanzas — are the long musings of a lonely man on how peaceful yet trivial and uneventful life is in his new home, settled but not contented.

But what makes this deeply personal poem relevant is that the author, our national hero, still inserted into it his aspiration for a better country. Lisa Guerrero Nakpil pointed to me these lines, “Faith do I have, and I believe the day will shine when the Idea shall defeat brute force as well; and after the struggle and the lingering agony a voice more eloquent and happier than my own will then know how to utter victory’s canticle.” Most writers describe the poem as gloomy. But this line is hopeful. Lisa said the key is to define what idea Rizal was talking about that would defeat brute force. Of course, that idea is a better Philippines with liberty, freedom and the equality of all men.

That is why Almario suggested that we look beyond the oversimplification that the poem is only about acceptance and finding joy in a limiting space. We should look at “Mi Retiro” as a twin sister of Rizal’s “Mi Ultimo Adios.” Rizal’s “Mi Retiro” is the swan song before “Mi Ultimo.” They are complementary and can be appreciated if taken together and constitute Rizal’s long goodbye to the nation. Aside from both being quintets, the last stanza of “Mi Retiro” is answered in “Mi Ultimo’s” last line, “Morir es descansar” — to die is to repose, to retreat, to rest. Rizal had found peace in dying because the “idea” was already being brought forth. That idea is the Filipino nation.