Being

In one moment, I felt myself released

from time, from space, from history —

I saw my being as comprised of

what I’d always thought was hope

but now I saw was truth,

the impulse given me,

the exclamation of my presence

which nothing can diminish

In another moment, standing

freshly in the garden,

with the rain stopped

and all the scents rising

in the open gratitude

for all this life given,

I was clearly here,

attached to these particulars,

still with this purpose

of being joy.

©Wendy Mulhern

April 29, 2016

Shelters

Later in life, I’ve found

there are many kinds of shelter,

many ways we lean upon each other,

many structures that give us what we need

(fairy tale castles, after all,

being hard to come by,

and within, beset by drafts and rodents,

picture perfect cottages proved lacking

in dimension)

I have a lean-to in a corner of my mind

that’s made of nothing, as far as I can tell,

except my love,

I have a fire

that delights me every time

I find it still burning,

its cheering flames

produced by time with friends

I have a sense that after

all my fumbling efforts at this life,

the shelters lost, or casually abandoned,

I’ll come to find that nothing mattered,

and everything did,

that shelter resides

in any circle of support,

and they are numerous

as crystals on the shore.

©Wendy Mulhern

April 28, 2016

Rise Up

You are innocent.

There are no wrongs

for which you must atone,

no layers of pain and shame

rolled up in justification,

rolled up in anger,

rolled up in desperate deeds

There is no errant course

that justifies your bondage,

no years indentured

that you have to pay,

there are no habits

which keep you stooped, submissive,

no lock and key upon your day

You are innocent,

and you are thereby free

to shine the light of you, to be

the things you always sensed

were your potential.

You have not lost them,

you have not forgotten,

you have not failed

to take the needed way.

Stand up and walk —

all blunders are forgiven —

You are granted your primal peace today.

©Wendy Mulhern

April 27, 2016

No Contest

There will be no more contests.

I, at least, will not compete

for those dubious awards —

most envied,

most evolved,

most tragically thwarted

(or more exalted ones

I deemed outside my range)

I won’t pursue them for myself

or for my children,

won’t play for them in back rooms

of my mind

I have had enough now.

It’s time to take myself and,

as I can, lay aside those filters

and those trappings.

It’s time to meet each being

with the attention that he or she or it deserves,

having been put here, after all,

in this place, in this moment,

so we could uplift each other,

so we could be in awe

of how amazingly

Life provides our joy.

©Wendy Mulhern

April 26, 2016

An Answer of Peace

Let me not presume

to have the self-importance

to get it wrong. To tell myself

“if only you see better, 

and rightly understand,

then all will flourish — 

if your life is blighted,

you need to work harder”

Let me not imagine,

in the face of the fullness

of everything,

that I have the power

to get it wrong.

It’s not in me —

Life will provide me

an answer of peace.

©Wendy Mulhern

April 24, 2016

Listing

Sometimes in moments

in between the trees

as my feet fall quiet on the walk,

I feel a tug that lists me slightly

to the left

and must remind myself

I’m through with pining,

through with indulging

that restless loneliness

that knows not what it wants

but feels bereft

I must remember

There isn’t anything

that, if I had, would make me happy,

there isn’t anything I lack,

and what I need

I carry here within me

and when I’m feeling lost,

it brings me back.

©Wendy Mulhern

April 23, 2016

Creativity

Being creative

is part of the plan,

part of the everyday joy,

not for some but not others —

a primal fact of life

You are creative as dandelions,

as flickers and robins,

as today’s breath of wind

and quiet rain

You are creative

as the delighted adaptation

of everything

to the moment’s confluences —

It is your due

that every step be creative,

as needed as comfort,

as close as home.

©Wendy Mulhern

April 22, 2016

Dawn

After the dawn extinguished

all the little glows, all the distant

points of light, all the length

of last night’s vigil

As the warmth flows through you,

softening the rigid edges,

as the climbing sun

releases grateful scents

from fronds and blossoms,

you may notice 

that every stumbling footstep in the dark

was needed, every little light was real

And though the dawn would come no matter what,

the yearning that you called your life still helped —

it helped you recognize it,

helped you feel its gifts

and reap its prizes.

©Wendy Mulhern

April 21, 2016

Silence

And maybe there are times

when there isn’t anything

to be said,

but it’s important to be there,

to share a silence,

to share the weight of presence,

to sit with someone

as they descend through a process

you may or may not understand

And sometimes you might detect

that you have walked a parallel path,

and there might still be

nothing to say about it.

You, too, might benefit

from the ballast of silence.

©Wendy Mulhern

April 20, 2016

Language

Let me translate your words

back into light, back into

towering grand fir, gracious at evening,

green glow of grass in western sun,

purple of delicate iris

Let me translate your actions

back into desire,

into the impulse of being seen,

of connecting, belonging,

and being uniquely needed

This is the original language,

shared by bees and geese and ravens

and whatever bird it is that

sends that trill of liquid joy

continually across the land —

this is the language

in which we are understood.

©Wendy Mulhern

April 19, 2016

Filled

May you be filled, daily

with what you desire daily,

that thirst that opened up in you

when the deep crevasse was formed,

when you cracked open

and the molten light welled up

swift and searing and so satisfying,

(and you had never before even known

of the desire before that happened)

May you be open like that daily,

and may you be filled.

©Wendy Mulhern

April 18, 2016

This Smile

I traced the line of your lips

with my finger,

I touched your cheek.

That was all it took, really —

that kind of attention

calls forth affection

as if out of nowhere

I smile. You are not sure —

you really hope to believe it

but I have been less than warm

for longer than I’d noticed.

So you’ll look again

with that hope in your eyes,

hope for this smile,

which, really,

how could I have withheld it?

©Wendy Mulhern

April 15, 2016

Partnership

Each step we take is tiny.

There is, it seems, extreme effort

to any thing we can say in a sentence

that we did —

It’s astonishing

we don’t accomplish more

Yet we find a sense of owning, of tending,

that grows as if without our efforts —

I feel the land responding,

settling in to trusting us,

moving, generous, to aid

the things we’ve planned

Grand things will happen,

but it’s good to know

we are already here.

©Wendy Mulhern

April 16, 2016

Lazy

Let’s not call ourselves lazy,

as the wind plays the chimes

and ushers cherry blossom petals,

not unkindly, along,

as needle fall, from douglas fir,

makes its dry ptick against the wooden bench

Let’s not call ourselves lazy

to be lifted thus, by sun and scented breeze,

to notice the pace of insects,

to be in dialog with what will grow,

in gentle give and take

with what the garden offers

Indeed, it is not lazy

to honor the pace

of our breath, our days,

to take time to listen,

and know to offer

only what, right here, right now

can be received

These tendrils we develop,

these tender patterns we pioneer,

will prove essential

as our sights clear.

©Wendy Mulhern

April 14, 2016

Choice

Whether or not you get to choose what happens,

you always have the choice

how you feel about it. Not to recommend

some sort of tortured mind game,

a mental strong-arming,

a set of taut constructs

But you have the choice

to stop and look,

you have the choice to not

go down the cataract

with all your wild emotions,

you have the choice to stand there

in the tumble of them

and wait

And you have the choice

to stand still

and let the pool of you

fill with your essence,

and you can use that —

all that overflowing light —

to find your way out.

©Wendy Mulhern

April 13, 2016

Version (intro or extra)

and in solitude,

how shall one pursue the baubles

and the light that comes

from their exchange?

but in multitude,

the jostling shifting

of everyone’s efforts,

how can one find and proffer

the right one?

it’s easy enough to go home

without having said anything,

without engaging,

easy enough to say

one didn’t need it, anyway,

or didn’t need it here

if there’s a whole other being,

a light inducing, producing,

seducing incandescence,

luminescence from within

all satisfying,

it still should serve

to lead to bright connections,

not wean one from them,

don’t you think?

©Wendy Mulhern

April 12, 2016