My Life

The sigh of waves that reach 

but fall back down

again and again,

the washing back

that comes to seem devoid of hope,

the pointlessness of swells that never crest,

that never swoop and crash —

this is just a story, just a metaphor

The roll of water circles satisfied

underneath the surface,

the wave proceeds across the whole ocean.

The catch along the shallow bottom

that trips them, makes them fly forward

is just another phase of what they do

So rolls my life,

fuller, surely, than I’ve ever known,

the power of this moment

still more or less unharnessed,

not waiting for the vagaries

of bottom depth, of ship’s wake,

but drawing from a purpose of its own

to round out all the edges of what rises from within,

to fill the waiting hollows with its song.

©Wendy Mulhern

September 16, 2016