Painting-Poem Analysis: Light in the Forest

Light in the Forest*

Federico Urmatam

A scene from Light in the Forest mural in acrylic by AV Rotor, 

Living with Nature Center, San Vicente, Ilocos Sur 

I'm lost, wandering in a forest ever since -

Could this be Paradise, the lost Paradise?

I never knew its edge, its height, its might,

I never knew myself, minuscule to its size. 

Amidst a sea of green and towering giants, 

Piercing the sky, shrouded by mist and rain;

I'm lost in their limbs veiled by moss and vine,

Cloaked by a mantle of unending green.

For how long I've slept, no one will ever know;

And it doesn't matter who my ancestor was,

Waking up into a Homo sapiens.  Lo!

By the Forbidden Tree and its fruit.  Alas!

And I, I have been a wanderer since then,

Driven away by guilt forever worn,

Away from prison, away from the Eye,

Waking up to the Light every morn. ~

Analysis Guide Questions:

1. Identify the rhyme scheme used in the poem.
2. What is the message of the poem?
3. Explain the notion that man is a wanderer in the context of the poem.

* Published in Philippine Literature Today by Abercio V Rotor and Kristine Molina-Doria C&E Publishing 1915.  Guest writer, the late Federico Urmatam, was a close friend and co-writer of Dr. Rotor in The Furrows campus magazine of then Araneta University in the 60s, now De La Salle Araneta University.  DLSAU is the seventh member of De La Salle System. It was established in 1946 as the Araneta Institute of Agriculture.