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I had written this poem way back 1995 when I was in first year high school for our school paper. As a freshman, I was really challenged to surmount the achievements of the so-called 'older ones'. This poem is very special to me because it is the product of my desire to do things greater than what older people can do. The poem conveys that small things are not only bright and wonderful, rather, useful too. Its meaning is universal and multi-dimensional.

I made used of a very basic style in writing this poem. I observed rhyme and simplicity in language. To add a little twist, I personified the candle. Basically, the entire poem is a dialogue between the reader and the candle. The setting is in Bethlehem where baby Jesus was born. It was the very first Christmas, though, it's not blatantly told. The context clues I had given say so.

Because of its simplicity, the poem was published in our school paper and in our yearbook. The poem too was published in Quill Books's hardbound edition volume, A Time To Be Free, last 1998 in Harlingen, Texas.

A Candle
by Jocell Siyangbigay Maranan

O little candle in the night!!,
burning in the room very bright!!
Its head bows lowly,
pointing back and forth so slowly

Look outside the brick window!
See the stars shooting below!
See the moon and its lasting brightness!
Feel the night and its chilling coldness!

You are comparably smaller,
to those decorative celestial wonders
How could you make the darkness,
turned out to be the brightest?

Why do you have to sacrifice,
yourself so scarce to suffice?
Are you enough for the night,
to make the room very bright?