A Field Trip to a Nature's Mural:

"Art is the greatest human expression of beauty, thoughts, feelings and spirituality that connect man and his Creator." avr

Wall Murals by Dr Abe V Rotor 

Living with Nature Center

San Vicente, Ilocos Sur

Off from their bikes near a mural of nature,
they sought in its shadow  rest and relief, 
in make-believe comfort from adventure,

in imagery though passing and brief.

Faithful to the sense of vision and imagination,

these murals are alive with happy children;

Wonder how long they last as the kids grow up,

as colors and memories fade 'til they're gone.

and the lesson lost with the sinking sun.

"One for all, and all for one*, " cried the musketeers 

in Alexandre Dumas' classic novel;

who's the enemy today, who are the brave knights? 

if ever the cry's still heard clear as a bell. 

The bell that tolls for the dead in the battlefield,

 victims of calamities and injustice; 

now a chime in the once beautiful landscape.

dirge for a natural world we will all miss.  

A natural world reminiscent in murals 

on the wall asking how long they shall last;

like a puzzle of the mirror on the wall,

and the bell for whom it tolls for none but us.** 

The rays of building archives cast over us, 
the aftermath of the arts
as it has always been in the past; 
yet this is not the rational of the arts, 
but the highest human expression
of beauty, thoughts and feelings
and spirituality
that connect man and his Creator. ~

*(Un pour tous, tous pour un; also inverted to All for one, and one for all) is a motto traditionally associated with the titular heroes of the novel The Three Musketeers written by Alexandre Dumas père, first published in 1844. An expression from a sermon by John Donne. Donne says that because we are all part of mankind, any person's death is a loss to all of us: “Any man's death diminishes me, because I am involved in mankind; and therefore never send to know for whom the bell tolls; it tolls for thee.” A novel (1940) by Ernest Hemingway.**