Wagi sa Yamang Isip
The legal tenderness of Christine V. Lao
by Rawl Maliwat
March 23, 2026
Where the language of law meets the pulse of life, poetry can be found. This sentiment has been a driving force throughout the dynamic professional journey of Atty. Christine V. Lao and lies at the heart of her recent book of poems, Affidavit of Loss.
Affidavit of Loss attempts to make sense of the reality of loss by tracing what is true and known. The title draws on the nature of an affidavit—a sworn statement where a person formally reports the loss of an item and narrates events that have led to that loss. But loss in this book does not only pertain to tangible things. It recognizes loss as a condition of mourning what has been taken or left behind. For Lao, legal language can fall into the trap of losing meaning when it is enforced selectively, or worse, turned against the people it is meant to serve.
Lao currently teaches creative writing at the University of the Philippines Diliman. Affidavit of Loss is her first book of poetry.
Affidavit of Loss was put together over the course of over 15 years, bearing witness to Lao’s legal interest in children’s rights, carceral reform, inclusive development policy and justice for the urban poor—branches of law practice concerned with the protection of human dignity.
The book is also heavily influenced by Lao’s career in the legal domain, primarily as a former consultant to an international organization and a judicial staff head at the Supreme Court of the Philippines. In 2017, she also served as a consultant for the Intellectual Property Office of the Philippines (IPOPHL), assisting in the development of its National Intellectual Property Strategy at the time.
A vigilant watch over authors’ rights
Lao is a firm advocate of writers learning more about their rights and responsibilities so they can make informed decisions to protect themselves and likewise avoid doing harm. Such knowledge can also open new opportunities.
“If people are uninterested or afraid, they don’t even have the opportunity to recognize the opportunity,” Lao said.
. . . When the lustrous fog rises to claim me,
I do not yet have the words: immutable
solitude; mysterious loss . . .
—from “Mysterious loss”
This awareness proved valuable during the call for submissions for the 2015 Carlos Palanca Memorial Awards for Literature. Before entering contests or submitting to publications, Lao had made a habit of reviewing the copyright terms governing submitted works. She noticed the prize had introduced expansive provisions granting sponsors concurrent and non-exclusive authority to exercise full copyright control over current and previous winning works, alongside a waiver of moral rights.
Under the Philippine Intellectual Property Code, authors may waive moral rights in writing, but this waiver can be deemed invalid if it harms their reputation or results in misattribution. Moral rights also cannot be assigned or licensed, and the right of attribution continues in perpetuity, even after the author’s death.
Lao surmised that this may have simply been a case “where overzealous lawyers have crafted rules to protect the client but end up defeating the client’s ultimate objective.” Nevertheless, she felt it was important to raise the issue so other participating writers could make an informed decision, posting publicly on Facebook and sparking discussion among prominent local authors. The Carlos Palanca Foundation’s response was swift and positive, suspending the rules for review and ultimately removing the contested provisions.
Between policy and poetry
However, Lao doesn’t mince words about the parameters of copyright law. While this has facilitated the success of artists who are more commercially savvy, it may lack appeal to those for whom income is not a primary motivating factor in practicing their craft. This is a global challenge noted even by the World Intellectual Property Organization (WIPO), which observed that artists’ motivations exist in a complex web of trade-offs and contradictions that go beyond economic interests.
“To promote copyright, we must appeal to the creative understanding of artists. Appeal to the value with which they see the work,” Lao said.
Oh, how we have grown,
who legislate mousetraps
lying in wait
for the nothing
the no one
that knows no law
—from “Ignorance of the law excuses no one”
IPOPHL’s Bureau of Copyright and Related Rights (BCRR) is taking this challenge seriously in its mandate to promote greater copyright awareness and engagement within the creative sector. Unlike some jurisdictions, the Philippines emphasizes moral rights alongside economic rights in literature, protecting the reputation, legacy and cultural contribution of authors. Authors retain the right to be credited for their work and to prevent distortion or misuse that could harm their honor or integrity. The fair use doctrine, while open to interpretation, balances these protections with the realities of creative discourse, which relies on adaptation, reinterpretation and transformation as well as the intertextual nature of literary works.
Through its Copyright Plus Program, which has been running for nearly four years, the BCRR empowered hundreds of under-resourced artists to claim ownership of their works. By recognizing creative works as extensions of their identities, the program affirms the importance of protecting authorship. Its outcomes have also created spillover effects, helping highlight how copyright protection safeguards culture.
A convergence of two roads
Affidavit of Loss bears witness to Lao’s belief in the power of the human spirit to flourish. The opening poem “Portrait of heart as Saraswati’s lute” underscores what is lost when the law is not in harmony with people’s behaviors and desires.
. . . Where the heart root ought to be, a hollow place
the shape of a full moon’s shadow. A mouth waiting to be filled.
Emptied of words, the world.
—from “Portrait of heart as Saraswati’s lute”
And yet, despite the law’s strict eye, there is still room for personal transformation to happen and creativity to thrive, as in “On most days, nothing” where “Seeds bloom into weeds. // Need-nourished greed breaks open / the pavement.”
For Lao, the publication of Affidavit of Loss is the culmination of a long, winding journey—one that has brought together her enduring fascination with language as a vital force in both law and human life. Yet even after stepping away from the legal profession, this is not a letting go; rather, it marks the beginning of a more comprehensive and critical engagement with the law through poetry.
“Law actually makes you imagine a world differently. It’s an abstraction of how life is,” Lao said. In this, it shares much with poetry, which at its very best, can transform the way a person lives their life for good.