Growing up in a world of bamboo

Abe V Rotor

Bamboo grove, pastel drawing, AVR 1995

To see the world in a grove of bamboo
is seeing our ancestors in their time,
in the rustic world of Amorsolo
far, far away from the city scene,
hidden by a curtain of green.

It’s an arena of wit, skill and joy,
of laughter that fills the pure air
echoed by the swaying bamboo
playing with children in scary creak
the original game of hide-and-seek.

Here nobody wins or loses the game
because there are no walls, no fences,
and there's no time to gain or to lose;
it’s a world into men children grow,
simple and true like the bamboo. ~