This Life...Is It Really Beautiful? Poem by Ola Joseph Kolawole

This Life… Is It Really Beautiful?

Many times, I’d wondered how reasonable it is to say such statements as “Life is Beautiful…”

What is the beauty of life? – The Big Question:

Is it in seeing beautiful flowers blooming with radiant colours, which makes you appreciate the creativity of God…?
Or in seeing very ugly disease cases in hospitals, making you wonder why a merciful god should allow such in the first instance?

Is it in receiving such free gifts as air, water and sunshine without having to pay…?
Or in meeting people like your very selves who still have to pay for the same oxygen that you receive for free?

Is it in the joy of being educated…?
Or in the pains of knowing that some people can’t afford it?

Is it in hearing the melodious chirpings of the birds…?
Or in knowing that there are still people who are deaf and couldn’t hear what you hear?

Is it in seeing the ever renewing wonders of nature…?
Or in remembering the blind men on the streets who aren’t privileged to see what you see?

Is it in exclaiming “Ouch” each time you step on a sharp object…?
Or in minding the fact that some people don’t even have legs, let alone stepping on such objects?

Is it in being a part of a wonderful wedding ceremony that aggravates your wanting to be married…?
Or in witnessing sittings of divorce cases in our magistrate courts day after day?

Is it in receiving lovely smiles at intervals of few minutes from friends and loved ones…?
Or in acknowledging the fact that some people can’t afford to smile because of the rotten teeth they got from a mere food-borne infection?

Is it in seeing your neighbour say “hi” every morning…?
Or in returning in the evening only to hear that the same neighbour is dead?

………..hmm………. this Life!

I was young;
And now, I’m “younger”…
I’ve never seen any perfect reason to believe the saying that “LIFE IS BEATIFUL”, save the fact that the GIVER OF LIFE DWELLS IN ME!

I beseech you therefore, by the understanding of the Complexity of Life that you have, that you present your HEART neat and fit for the Giver of Life to dwell in…

Such that where everyone says there is a casting down, you shall say there is a lifting up!

And this is the confidence that I have in God:
HE GIVES BEAUTY FOR ASHES…Selah!

May 8,2008
ola kolawole