Life and letters from Mindanao mountains: Personal narratives of struggle and community

By Harsh Thakor*

Joven Obrero’s Warriors, Poets, Friends: My Life in the Mindanao Mountains is a deeply personal and literary account of life within the revolutionary movement in the Philippines, particularly in the Mindanao mountains. Through a mix of poems, letters, and vignettes collected over decades, the book offers a window into the everyday struggles, sacrifices, and aspirations of those who chose to live and fight among the rural communities.

The author traces her journey back to 1980, when she first immersed herself in the life of the guerrillas and the people of Mindanao. What began as private correspondence with a close friend eventually grew into a body of writing spanning 38 years, now curated as a tribute to comrades, communities, and the broader revolutionary cause. The letters, often written on scraps of paper and preserved across time, serve as both historical fragments and personal reflections.

The work is neither a comprehensive history nor a systematic chronicle of the armed struggle; Obrero herself acknowledges its limitations. Instead, it functions as a mosaic of lived experience—part memoir, part tribute, part poetic meditation. She recalls encounters with indigenous peoples and peasant settlers, documents moments of hardship such as illness and natural calamities, and pays homage to fallen comrades through elegiac verse.

Stylistically, the book alternates between lyrical poetry and short prose narratives, blending reportage with reflection. The poems are simple yet evocative, while the prose often situates individual experiences within the larger currents of revolutionary struggle. The text frequently invokes themes of perseverance, dialectics, and renewal—linking personal survival to collective resilience.

The book also highlights the contradictions of revolutionary life: joy in community-building alongside the grief of loss, the hope of liberation set against the state’s violent repression. Obrero does not shy away from the difficulties of sustaining guerrilla life but frames them as part of a larger process of transformation.

For readers interested in the intersection of literature and political struggle, Warriors, Poets, Friends offers insight into how revolutionary commitment is expressed through personal narrative. Its value lies not so much in providing a detached historical account, but in documenting the voice of a participant who sought to merge art, memory, and political conviction.

The book can be appreciated as both a literary work and a testament to a particular chapter in the Philippines’ continuing social conflicts. While its perspective is firmly rooted in revolutionary ideals, it provides an important primary source for understanding how individuals interpret and narrate their involvement in collective struggle.

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*Freelance journalist

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