When you move on

Don’t worry — after you’ve left behind

everything you thought you were —

your quirks and your requirements,

your suffering and dearly held delights,

after you’ve abandoned

all the things you once described as “me”,

you’ll still recognize yourself

It won’t be like a distant memory,

vague and foggy, held as maybe true,

or it will be that way for just a little while

like fog at dawn

And that clean brilliance,

that sun-on-dewdrop freshness 

of your being,

that young and smooth

as eucalyptus bark

essence of yourself,

will be the meaning of your name,

will be what you have always known.

©Wendy Mulhern

October 17, 2018