Frank Cimatu is a poet and journalist based in Baguio City, where the mountains have shaped both his imagination and his work. He contributes to Rappler and co-runs Mountain Beacon, an independent Facebook-based news outlet. He is the author of three poetry collections: Ang Mga Prusisyong Dumaan sa Unang Bangungot, Birdcatching in Sagada and Other Poems, and O and Other Illuminations. Prusisyon won the 20th Madrigal-Gonzales Best First Book Award in 2021. For Cimatu, poetry has often been another form of witnessing. His engagement with human rights began long before the Duterte years; in 2013, he started Duterte Karaoke, bringing artists and writers together at Katipunan Cafe to sing songs of protest. He has collaborated with Amnesty International on human rights projects. In 2023, Mountain Beacon launched Literary Tuesday, opening a space where writers could respond to the country’s shifting realities. Poems about truth, justice and Tokhang began arriving in numbers. They became the seeds of this book — poems born from a time of violence and uncertainty, and from the stubborn belief that words can remember what power would rather forget.