Existence Like A Sunset

[Existence Like a Sunset is a continuing collection of pieces with different themes. The hope is that in the end all of these themes will merge into a single unifying one. This is the first part for the theme Alone.]

Alone #1

Sunlight crawls through the vertical blinds landing on a blue wooden chair. The chair sits in a corner next to the entrance of the kitchen. The sunlight having moved throughout the apartment, touching tables and plants, some clothes lying on the back of the couch drying in the front of the fan, briefly examined corners where ceiling meets wall, a stack of books, computer, lingers on a black and white photograph, perhaps recalling the day it created the image for someone, and finally it seems, as if tired of its journey, decides to rest on and around that blue chair. The chair seems to pull all of the remaining, weak light to itself wanting to be noticed. It’s just a chair though. Nothing about it is special. As far as chairs go, you might walk past it a hundred times, dimly aware of its existence. It takes up space after all. You never actually sit, except perhaps on a whim, and then for only a short time. It isn’t very comfortable. On the rare occasion a group gathers, someone may need to sit in it, glad for its presence. They never think about the chair after its purpose is complete nor choose to return to it when those people have moved on and other options exist. Yet there it sits, the blue chair, in the corner beneath a framed college degree. If it were to break or a desire to put something more pleasing to look at took hold, or if something came along with more function, the blue chair would be discarded, perhaps to the trash bin or sat on the curb to find its way to another apartment . There it would sit in a similar corner, surrounded by other plants and books, another couch beside it, different photos on the walls, and when it happens, sat upon when another group gathers, but only briefly. I suddenly have an urge to get up from the couch, cross the room, and sit on the blue chair, but I know I won’t. The light that pools around it is dimming, photons one by one, racing off to dance elsewhere, their respite over. Soon all of the light will be gone and there will be nothing to draw any attention to it, and it will be what it is, always has been, and forever will be: a wooden blue chair tucked away in an unimportant corner of my life.