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There she stood on the edge
of the cliff of loneliness—her
tiny eyes staring out into space.
As I cautiously approached her,
I softly asked if everything was ok.
She replied that everything was fine;
that she just wanted to spend some
time with herself to find out why
she was always the way she was.
Behind us, the sun was setting
and before us the gibbous moon
was rising—a celestial canvassing—
We both marveled at this prettiness.
She turned to me and asked if I thought
that she was a pretty girl. I looked at her
and shared with her that when I was a young
boy, my aunt who raised me, told me that God
didn’t like ugly and never created any; that I was
the apple of his eye and that there’s no beauty like
the blackness God gave to me and the starry night.
I then went on to say that I thought that she was
more than just pretty; that as far as I could see,
she was beautiful—created in the image of the
author of beauty himself. God Almighty!
I went on to share with her something that
profoundly uplifted me when I read a poem
written by Nikki Giovanni several decades ago
in which she reminded us that whenever we
look into a mirror, we will always see another
one of God’s beautiful creatures looking back
at us reflecting the creative beauty that only
God could conceive and share with the world.
With a small liberated smile that she thought
she had held captive, she said that whenever
she looked into any mirror, she didn’t see that
but rather, all she ever saw was a sad, ugly, and
Ionely little girl, who had no friends except her
mom and other old people in her family.
I went on to say that from what my eyes were
beholding, that I was inclined to feel that perhaps
she had always been looking in the mirror of others
and was seeing what others thought she reflected;
that she needed to look into her own self mirror and
see the reflection of who she really is in the eyes
of God and in the eyes he had given to her to see.
That little smile stole another moment of freedom
again as she curiously responded that she didn’t get
this mirroring thing that I keep bringing up to her;
that I was beginning to sound like the preacher
on Sundays who always saying confusing things.
With divine wisdom and guidance, I went on to say to
her that within each of us there’s a spiritual mirror of
truth whose reflected essence can only be vision by who
it belongs because it reflects the true self of one’s self.
Continuing, I went on to say to her that my mirror’s
reflection of her is just that—how I see her being who
she is and that her spiritual mirror reflection of herself
was just that—the who she truly is in being who she is.
I went on to say to her that when she got home today,
don’t go stand in front of a mirror, rather, lie down and
look into the spiritual mirror within her and focus on who
she really is. And tomorrow when she comes to school,
she could, if she felt inclined to, let me know how it went.
Finally, I said this to her: Hey! Liberate that cute smile!
I can hardly wait for tomorrow to come. Meanwhile,
I share with you the following poem that was born out
of this spiritual canvassed happenstance:
Be the one you are—
God never makes a mistake:-
Blessed—be who you are.
Be the you God made—
You can’t exit who you are:-
Always be, God’s you.
Mirrored true beauty—
God’s mirror reflecting you:-
Be His reflection.
P.S.: (Penned Earlier)
To Awareness In The Midst Of Loneliness
Sitting here I felt as if I was drowning
until I realized that I was just sitting there
seemingly all alone being pulled deep
down into life’s pool of memories
which can sometimes leave you breathless.
As a mood of safety slowly flowed over me,
I realized that I had not been alone at all; that
my three best friends had been there with me
all the time: God, the Father, God, the Son,
and God, the Holy Ghost—the faithful Trinity
bringing with them, the beautiful and wise spirits
of my ancestors and all of the extended family
spirits that had gone on before me.
What seemed to have been solitude drowning
became a crowded whirlpool of joy. All too often,
in times of trials, tribulations, and uncertainty, we
tend to forget our blessings—how often God has lifted us
from the bowels of hell, into the bright sunshine of His grace.
