Five Verses for Meditation

Mural: Vietnam War - a collective memory.
Vietnam War Museum , Ho Chih Minh City

Abe V Rotor

It is collective memory of which I am a part
That writes my life’s story when I depart.

In art, if you go abstract you lose reality.
How can I paint spirituality and beauty?

It is always the big fish that got away,
Is an old story. Lo, to the innocent prey.

It is not only suffering that ennobles character,
but joy, happiness and laughter.

Love is sweeter after pain
And perhaps never sweeter again.~

Living with Nature 3, AVR

When planting a tree seedling, avoid looking up.

Abe V Rotor

When planting a tree seedling, avoid looking up so that the plant will not grow very tall. Stoop when planting coconut so it will not grow very tall.

Old folks are fond of personification, making things, living or non-living, as if they are people themselves, thereby establishing communication with them.

Thus our messages are encoded in ways we think they respond. Stooping is a sign for the coconut to bear nuts early, or not looking up so that an orange seedling not to grow too tall. We should be able to pick the fruits it will bear by hand.

All these are spices to add quaintness to culture. “Just do it, nothing is lost, anyway,” old folks usually advise the skeptic.~

Living with Nature 3, AVR

What is Civilization?

Aftermath of atomic bomb dropped on Hiroshima, Japan 1945

Abe V Rotor

Corrupting is civilization to Mankind;
Better was life the Noble Savage had lived;
In the Garden of Eden we have long envied,
Sans want, sans war and their evil kind.

Living with Nature 3, AVR

Children are Children

Abe V Rotor

Water pipe leak along E Rodriguez Ave., QC

But children are children,
Knowing not a mob or crowd;
Curiosity, danger and dream
Lie behind a thin shroud.

Living with Nature 3, AVR

What good is rock?

Abe V Rotor

Pine seedling growing on weathered rock, Trinidad Valley, Benguet

Ah, but what good is rock if it misses
the essence of clay where life itself rises

Living with Nature 3, AVR

Drawing Exercise: Field of Sunflowers

Sunflower field (photo) and Closeup of sunflowers (painting). Models
for drawing. Do not copy. Acknowledgment: Wikipedia.Internet

Abe V Rotor

A lesson in radial symmetry, uniformity, and unity.

The sunflower has a central disc, surrounded by a ring of bright yellow petals which resemble the rays of the sun. But the most unique characteristic of the sunflower is that it faces the sun as it moves from sunrise to sunset. Because of its “obedience” to the sun, botanists gave the plant a genus name, Helianthes, after the Greek sun god, Helios.

Draw a field of sunflowers. Central Luzon State University in Munoz, Nueva Ecija, is the pioneer in sunflower farming. Imagine yourself to be at the center of sunflower farm. It is a bright day. Walk through the field among the plants as tall as you. Examine their long and straight stem and large leaves. Touch the large flowers, smell their sweet and fresh scent. Observe the bees and butterflies visiting one flower after another. Make the flowers prominent in your drawing. Remember they are uniform in size, height and color, and they are all facing the sun. Make the sky blue with some cloud to break the monotony.

You are given thirty minutes to complete your work. Use pastel colors on Oslo or drawing paper. Fill up the entire paper as if it were the whole field and sky. You may draw butterflies and bees. And you may draw yourself as you imagine yourself in a sunflower field. Here are suggested musical compositions for music background. “Humoreque”, “Minuet in G”, “Serenata”, “Traumerei”, “On the meadow”, “Spring Song”, “Ang Maya”.

Here is my version.

Sunflowers in acrylic

Living with Nature 3, AVR

Atop Mt. Pulag

The summit of Mt Pulag is vegetated with grass. It is a mossy forest. Trees are pushed down the slope. The tree line is made of gnarled shrubs perpetually dwarfened by wind. DENR Protected Area Office, Ambangeg, Benguet: Jump off point of any climb to Mt Pulag via the Ambangeg 'Fun' Trail. Mt. Pulag is considered the 2nd highest mountain in the Philippines, next to Mt. Apo. Mt. Pulag is typically different from the rainforest mountains. At its height at nearly three kilometers (2923 meters) it assumes a semi-temperate climate and an alpine biome.

Dr Abe V Rotor

If the mountain is a giant,
then I’m in Brobdingnag*;
where now I am a pygmy
when I was once a giant,
wishing the goodness I did
to come back to me.

Strange indeed is life:
At one time we are giants,
at another, dwarves,
giving essence to character
more than fairy tale;
but even in fairy tale,
we gain essence in character.

* Land of the giants in “Gulliver’s Travel,” by Jonathan Swift.
Written atop Mt Pulag 1984; acknowledgment: DENR, Internet, Wikipedia for the photograph.