Pink Plastic Chairs

Chairs sketch, watercolor and pencil

Pink Plastic Chairs

Piled high, and stuck together by the damp dirty air, I work to grab two chairs and set us up at the table. What will you share today? How can I serve you?

With your head down, you cry telling me how you’ve “lost everything.” “Everything,” you say. Your Section 8 housing, your three kids, your job, your boyfriend, your car, your family, your future. I tell you I see how painful things are for you right now. You repeat: “I’ve completely lost my future.” You can barely catch your breath. Your swollen eyes match the chairs, pink from crying. We breathe together. “How have you lost your future,” I ask. You think about this. Through your tears, you look at me and ask with all sincerity, “Do you think I’ve lost my future?”  

“How can you lose your future, when all we have is the present,” I ask you. 

The steel door slams nearby,

Or could that be the meditation bell?

Adjust your posture and come back to the breath.

In our pink chairs,

We are present in this moment.