This Gift Of Life Poem by Claude H Oliver II

We do not choose how we get here
We cannot choose our forebears
We cannot choose our brothers, sisters or
Whether we have either, both or none
We know not if our forebears will raise us or
Leave us to others or ourselves
We cannot choose from history’s menu
What courses we are served
We receive the time of our existence – unrequested, unreserved
No fore knowledge of things to be or not to be.

Yet this life offers
Love, hate, joy, sorrow, memories, knowledge, experience
And much more
Given freely with one limit – finality – an end
No announcement of precise date or time
We are given the choice of this life
To drink its fullness, to savor the spread before us
How we do is the book of each life.