os.popen output different from native shell output

[nickname]

Hi all,
       I am a relative newbie to python, I am using os.popen to run an
ls command. The output that I get using the read() function is
different in look and feel from when I run the ls command natively
from the shell (not via python). I display the ouput via python by
using the print function on the variable that accepts the os.popen
().read() function.

For example:

output from native shell (as seen on the bash shell)

file1 file2 dir1(highlighted in blue color)
file3longnamewhichwillcausenextfiletoappearonnextline

file 4

output from python (as seen on the bash shell)

file1
file2
dir1 (no blue color)
file3longnamewhichwillcausenextfiletoappearonnextline
file4

Is there an easy way to "mirror" the output. When python displays the
output, how can it tell the bash shell that some of the entries are
directories and they should appear blue on the bash shell, and that
everything should not be appearing on 1 column only.

Thanks for any pointers.