Life Is Fragile Poem by James Tipp

Life is fragile and gossamer thin
Like the transient life of the butterfly
Whose beauty adorns this world for hours
Then with all the intricacy of it’s making, dies.
We are called to beauty too, imaged in the maker
We who listen to the call and are made beautiful.
The one who hung pinned by the world, listens.
The Maker knows the second of our coming,
The second of our calling, the moment of our parting.
Yet we who stand outside this mystery are puzzled
Pain and confusion tear at our being, anger strikes.
The years of toil, pain, and sacrifice to follow, gone
In an instant wiped away, our faith put on hold.
We who speak of Gospel and trust, are tested
The pain no less real, our life no less torn apart.
We have the hope, but we also have the emptiness
The confusion that sees, ‘only dimly in the mirror’ *