Jose Corazon de Jesus (Huseng Batute), the writer who penned the Tagalog lyrics to the song “Bayan Ko,” was the same person who took part, along with Florentino Collantes, in the very first balagtasan ...

For a mambabalagtas, verbal joust and poetry are so much more than a way to express complex emotions and stories. While it was born as a form of entertainment during the bleak era of American ...