Lenten Season Resolution: Let Us Save the Heritage Acacia Trees Along the Highway

Lenten Season Resolution 

Let Us Save the Heritage Acacia* Trees 

Along the Highway 

In observance of the International DAY OF THE FOREST (March 21) 

and EARTH Day (April 22)

“Trees give peace to the souls of men.” -  Nora Waln

Photos taken from a moving car by Dr Abe V Rotor

March 24, 2023

"I came from Paradise Lost."

Adapted from Dead Tree Walking, AVR

Dr Abe V Rotor

I am the ghost of a tree that once stood before;

I am the conscience of man sleeping in its core.

I am the memory left in the distant past;

lost among the throng, now lying in the dust.

I came from Paradise lost, orphaned by the first sin;

the hands that cared for me can't now be seen.

I long for a heaven, a gift of being good and true,

but if heaven is only for man, then I'm happy too,

for I did serve him through.

I am a ghost now. Would man join me for a walk

to tell the world the story in an open book? 

 

"Now senile, their limbs are bare, their crowns empty."  

“It is not so much for its beauty that the forest makes a claim upon men’s hearts, as for that subtle something, that quality of air that emanation from old trees, that so wonderfully changes and renews a weary spirit.” ― Robert Louis Stevenson

"A living skeleton standing and about to fall.  Timber!" 

“For in the true nature of things, if we rightly consider, every green tree is far more glorious than if it were made of gold and silver.” — Martin Luther

 

"Move over trees; we need highways, sidewalks and buildings." 

"The tree is more than first a seed, then a stem, then a living trunk, and then dead timber. The tree is a slow, enduring force straining to win the sky.”― Antoine de Saint-Exupéry, author of The Little Prince

 

"Living towers, lonely and forgotten." 

“Trees are poems that the earth writes upon the sky.”— Kahlil Gibran

 

"Living towers. These trees are leaning dangerously over the highway, having lost their main limbs to give way to power and communication lines."

“Trees are sanctuaries. Whoever knows how to speak to them, whoever knows how to listen to them, can learn the truth.” -  Herman Hesse

 

"Grotesque and fearsome, this tree warns of danger to passersby." 

 

“A tree is our most intimate contact with nature.” ― George Nakashima

      

"Park at your own risk, but this is not the message.  

These trees are harmless, in fact benevolent to all." 

 

“Never say there is nothing beautiful in the world anymore. There is always something to make you wonder in the shape of a tree, the trembling of a leaf.” ― Albert Schweitzer

 

"Juvenile acacia trees - will they ever become heritage trees?

“The clearest way into the Universe is through a forest wilderness.” ― John Muir

Acacia - Samanea saman (Jacq.) Merr.) - known commonly as Rain Tree, Pukul Lima, Cow Tamarind, Hujan-Hujan, East Indian Walnut, Monkey-pod, Saman. mimosa, acacia, thorntree or wattle, is a polyphyletic genus of shrubs and trees belonging to the subfamily Mimosoideae of the family Fabaceae (Leguminosae). It was described by the Swedish botanist Carl Linnaeus in 1773 based on the African species Acacia nilotica. 

Samanea saman, also known as Rain Tree, is a tree, up 30 m tall. It is widely cultivated in Southeast Asia, especially Singapore, for its iconic umbrella-shaped crown which provides plenty of shade. The leaflets fold up during overcast days and in the early evening, therefore it is also known as Pukul Lima, which means ‘five o clock’ in Malay.
 

The acacia tree is believed to be around for over 20 million years as scientists have found fossilized charcoal deposits which seem to have acacia trees preserved in them.

(Internet)

“If you would know strength and patience, welcome the company of trees.” 

― Hal Borland

“To be without trees would, in the most literal way, to be without our roots.”

― Richard Mabey

“Anyone who thinks fallen leaves are dead has never watched them dancing

 on a windy day.”― Shira Tamir

Amazing features of the Acacia (From the Internet)

“Acts of creation are ordinarily reserved for gods and poets, but humbler folk may circumvent this restriction if they know how. To plant a pine, for example, one need be neither god nor poet; one need only own a shovel.”

― Aldo Leopold

“That each day I may walk unceasingly on the banks of my water, that my soul may repose on the branches of the trees which I planted, that I may refresh myself under the shadow of my sycamore.” – Egyptian tomb inscription

“He who plants a tree, plants a hope.”― Lucy Larcom ~

Acknowledgement: Quotations from the Internet