Discover the life of Maria Linda Hanihara through the pages of ‘Sub Rosa’
In our digital world, one documents life with snaps and small videos, be they for social media or just pieces to hold personally to remind oneself of special moments. But in the past, people used to not just mark events in their lives with images but also with words carefully composed to create a lovely poem.
That’s how Maria Linda Hanihara bookmarked her life. An award-winning creative writer, editor, lawyer, wife, and devoted mother to her special child, Mina Ellen, Linda succumbed to breast cancer in 2016. But what she left as her legacy to people took her entire life to build and that’s her poetry works, all collected in one book titled “Sub Rosa: The Crucifix of a Poet and other Poems.”
First printed in May 2014, “Sub Rosa” features poems she has written over a span of several years—poems she 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 traveling,” 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 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’s 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. In between chapters, readers will also find some of the artworks of the poet’s daughter.
“‘Sub Rosa’ is my offering to appease the past and inspire the future,” the late Linda said in the first release of the book. “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.”
“Sub Rosa: The Crucifix of a Poet and other Poems” is available only on Amazon.