The Scribbling Child

I sit, and stillness opens the curtain.
What once looked like nations at war, lovers undone, kings clashing over power—
now looks like a small child crouched on the floor,
scribbling life with broken crayons.

‍

Every mark is absolute in their eyes.
A jagged stroke is tragedy.
A bright circle is love.
A black smear is death.
They press harder, their tongue sticking out,
convinced this drawing is the whole world.

‍

And I—watching in stillness—smirk.
Not out of cruelty, but out of recognition.
I see myself in that child.
I see humanity in that child.
We all huff and puff with our sketches,
thinking the paper is the universe.

‍

The smirk is freedom.
It is hindsight turned into humor.
It is the tenderness of a parent
watching the child throw crayons across the room,
knowing it’s only practice.
Knowing none of it could touch the canvas of being itself.

‍

Meditation showed me this:
suffering is a drawing.
Ego is a drawing.
Joy is a drawing.
We are children of the infinite,
learning to trace, to color, to imagine.

‍

And when I see that—
when I see the little hands gripping crayons—
the whole human condition becomes funny,
beautiful, and forgivable.