Waterfall Meets the Sea

Siargao Waterfall wall mural by AVR and daughter Anna Christina Rotor, St Paul University Surigao

Buffers the Sierra Madre range the clouds buried deep,
Piling them thick while the aestivating frogs stir -
The sky falls like curtain blinding the hills of Laur;
In the morning after, glistens the plain like mirror.
Yes, the child returning to these hills remembering.

A tear rolls down and lands at some corner of his lips
Wrinkled by time, by thoughts serious, by thoughts happy,
And parting, whispers come out in the accent of old,
To friends endearing, gentle,and to the young assuring,
Flowing from deep within a prayer of thanksgiving.

Rolls half a century in deep retrospect, the man -
Three scores passed, here' the child striving to be man before -
He looks. Lo! The curtain rises, the sun spills over the hills
In kaleidoscope colors, reliving images of memory,
Sweetened by striving and success, blessed by Providence.

Laugh the rivulets and stony brook, tumbles the waterfall
With shouts deafening, pure joy of children of nature,
A place no one dies, who believes boyhood is forever;
To win a thousand-and-one trophies, with no bets and no rules,
Save instinct and wit and will, and the sun never sets.

What makes a man? Ask not some one who had gone to war,
Chores backbreaking he endured out of childhood sorrow,
Ever patient with the passing and coming of seasons;
Seasoned timber, mind steeled, only to time he yields,
To his young brothers, to the ideal, to a beautiful world.

He is old now and the cataract is but a eddy of a spring,
He touches the dying flow. Where have all the waters gone?
Yes, he sighs with relief, his gaze takes him far away,
And there the last drop of his waterfall meets the sea;
And the sea roars in gladness, roars in a thousand cheers.

In Memory of the late Hon. Sefrey A. Ordoñez, a good friend;
Justice Secretary, and Chairman, Human Rights Commission