Download the piano/vocal score.

BREATHE

TRAINEES
BREATHE, JUST BREATHE.

(Enter MARCUS DORAN, 52, a fit, tan-skinned Caucasian man in a long, flowing, powder-blue gown. His long gray hair dangles around his square jaw. He breathes deeply, striking a series of Thai-chi like poses, which the TRAINEES imitate as they form a semi-circle downstage, facing him. MARCUS settles into a pose upstage center, facing the TRAINEES and the audience. During the following, he strikes a different pose which the TRAINEES imitate.)

MARCUS
Every living being is but a vessel for Divine Spirits who travel between realms.

TRAINEES
BREATHE, JUST BREATHE.

MARCUS
These Spirits have seeded every human child with the bud of a silently gestating Sacred Lotus Flower.

TRAINEES
BREATHE, JUST BREATHE.

MARCUS
I vow to nurture this fragile bud by unobtrusively guiding the child's natural process of self-construction.

TRAINEES
BREATHE, JUST BREATHE.

(Music stops briefly.)

MARCUS
The child I was made me the man I am.

(inhaling and then exhaling)

That's it, everyone. Let your gratitude flow out on this next current of breath.

(MARCUS rings his gong. Music resumes. Lights up on all.)

ALL
BREATHE, JUST BREATHE. JUST BREATHE.

(MARCUS hands his gong off to an ATTENDANT, then exhales, lowering his arms in one fluid movement. His students do the same. After a beat, the music comes to a close as the TRAINEES spread their arms and improvise chaotic movements, bouncing randomly about the stage, shaking, shouting, and making shrill noises as if in a trance. CHARLOTTE DORAN, a young woman of 25, wearing a large traveler's backpack, enters from backstage right, looking sweaty and disheveled as though coming from a long hike. An ATTENDANT is trying to stop her.)

CHARLOTTE
(calling out to MARCUS)
So this is where you've been hiding.

(The TRAINEES and MARCUS stop. The ATTENDANT sighs. MARCUS looks astonished. EVERYONE stares at CHARLOTTE.)