In Search of Beauty | A Poem by Jacob Fiott

It’s not easy to see beauty in a “crucified world”. Is there really beauty around us: despite the immanent strife, pain, and death we all face? And if there is, how can we be more open to it? How can we let it guide us? Jacob Fiott explores all this (and more) in his recently penned poem, “In search of Beauty”.

 

In Search of Beauty

I look out the window

to see a restless night.

I close my eyes, so that I might for a while

escape the pain behind me.

 

There sat he

behind me

news on the telly.

He’d been on the news

some days ago.

Run over by a reckless driver.

Hit and run. Both legs mangled.

Forever injured.

 

Now the news spoke

of ground shattering war,

lives taken, families scattered.

War, famine,

death, destruction.

Brother deceiving brother.

A world in chaos.

 

And in this moment of despair,

in a world with no rhyme or reason,

I turn my face upwards towards the stars

and silently scream

“Where is my God?”

And I think to myself,

why do I expect to find God in hell?

 

What is this place we call our own

if not a man-made hell?

Here in the realm in which we tread,

in which we’ve spread our corruption,

we have silenced Heaven’s bell; for we no longer seek

it’s guiding toll, threw away the Holy Bread.

 

Our god is born from self-deception.

Greed and power-lust are its holy word.

We are a world of modern-day Mammonites.

The devil calls,

‘Come to me and I’ll reward ye

Wealth, power, all the world’s comforts shall serve ye…..if simply

Ye kneel before ”me.”

 

Tempted with an easy life,

a life of grazing on coin, engorged with recognition and fame

we’ve thrown our soul onto the pyre,

sold our soul to the devil’s fire.

So I clutch the crucifix hanging from my neck

pleading for a sign that God is listening.

But all I hear, in this darkened night, is the street below, brimming

with the desperate vibrations of a technological world,

a world desperate to make gods from men.

 

I squeeze my eyes, my mind swirls with thought.

What prayer ought I say?

What words may this mouth of a blasphemer speak?

I try to croak out a plea for help,

but the weight of my sins seems to pull the prayer into deep abyss

leaving in its wake a snake-like silence seemingly solid and unbreakable.

 

Until to my surprise,

through that deep solid silence,

A voice breaks in song.

 

It was a simple song

sweetly sung, its sound softly soaring and at times, falling.

Its simplicity seemed to lure me.

 

I lean back towards the song

and before long,

I can make out the words

constructing a song of praise

to Him who made all.

 

Slowly my eyes open, I turn round,

and there before me sits the singer,

wheelchair bound.

 

“How?”, “how can you find the words to sing

of beauty, in a world so sick without

love, a world so drenched in darkness and sin?”

 

A smile shined from his face and he said

“Finding the words is no hard feat,

when beauty is all around.

You just have to learn to see”.

 

My father used say;

“how does the sparrow fly so free

despite all that threatens it?

It flies because it knows

that beauty always grows

taller than terror.

 

It knows it can find shelter

in the trees that tower,

and find peace

among the smallest flowers.

Despite all that hunts it,

the sparrow never gives in.

 

And so must we never give up

just because of sin.

Just because there’s death

does not mean there’s no life.

There is still love

despite the strife.

The loving parent

who adores the child,

the patient teacher

who nurtures the mind,

The humble worker

to whom most are blind,

who toils and troubles

to serve.

 

There are many times

when humans sacrifice out of love.

It is this sacrifice

that raises us above

our monstrous desires.

 

Open your eyes

See past the lies

The world is not in darkness.

It isn’t all night.

Open your eyes and see the light.”

 

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