Waiting Room Poem by Leo C. Jones

White-washed walls
And white-washed curtains
White-washed halls
White, clear and certain.
It makes me wonder what it’s supposed to mean.
Is it meant to look pure
Look peaceful and calm?
Or to help one endure
While they wait with sweaty palms?
I’m not sure what it’s supposed to mean.

In the waiting room I sit,
The ticking of the clock taunts me
Me in a robe too loose to fit.
Again the thought of it haunts me,
What does it supposed to mean?

I look to my right,
At the thin-looking mister,
His eyes shut tight,
And he’s shriveled up like a blister.
I wonder what he thinks it means.
I look to my left,
At the girl with shaven hair.
She seemed kept,
She’s white as the walls that fill her stare.
I wonder what she thinks it means.

Too tired to sit so I lie instead,
In a cot that smelled fine but somehow with gloom
Impatiently sprawled, I was in bed,
For my turn to come in the waiting room.
I think I know what it’s supposed to mean.
To show me the color of the face I’ll be showing
White as the girl in my left I see.
To show me the color of the place I’m going
White as heaven ought to be.
I think that’s what it means.