Recurring Lesson

Back to the loop again

of learning

not to be afraid —

it’s not that difficult,

though it may seem so

in the echo chamber

of my benighted mind

I free myself from there

by tracing, in my thought,

the circle that enfolds us all,

that leaves out nothing,

so everyone, and every cause,

surrenders to the fact of being loved.

And in the all embracing love,

there is no fear.

©Wendy Mulhern

September 30, 2019

Traveling Smiles

The flight is full. I fill my soul

with comfort of humanity.

Some smiles are used to sell things,

but the ones caught here,

in the lines, the waiting,

the shifting into place —

these are free,

they sparkle three dimensions,

they reach deep

We can be herded and jostled,

scanned and screened and patted down,

but when we can smile to each other,

we keep our liberty.

©Wendy Mulhern

September 29, 2019

I take my shoes off

Once again, I settle in to Soul,

the home that dwells in every moment

waiting to support, affirm,

waiting to release me

I take my shoes off.

I breathe deep. No longer

out of breath from sweating,

I can find the rhythm

of the full cycle. No longer pinned

under conflicting propositions,

I feel myself float. I let myself expand

It’s so freeing to remember

I am not enslaved. I owe no consequence,

have no indebtedness,

no fear, no shame —

my life is here in Soul,

and Soul knows my name.

©Wendy Mulhern

September 28, 2019

New Sight

I will turn all the pictures in.

I will set my eyes to see

at cross dimensions,

in places that cut between,

that take the same colors

but make of them a wholly different story

Every story told in terms of good and bad

will change to true accounts of fine engagement —

they will sparkle easy grace

and glow with an intensity of depth,

they will shine with courage and surrender —

courage in how much we give for love,

surrender as we recognize

we never need to earn it

There won’t be anything there

that puts us in a bad light,

for there we will be seen for what we are.

©Wendy Mulhern

September 27, 2019

Lunch with God

You might go to sit down

and have lunch with God.

And it wouldn’t have to be different

from any other lunch — that is,

you can’t really have lunch

(or any moment) without God

You couldn’t have lunch 

without life, without consciousness,

without some level of desire

These things are signs

of some much deeper

dimension of being,

that which moves you

at the very core

So if you pay attention —

if you really think these things through,

you’ll see you’re well companioned,

indeed, royally.  And you can deeply savor

your lunch with God.

©Wendy Mulhern

September 25, 2019

Building

We go each day to the house

to see how we will be built,

what skills and insight, what endurance

will arise in us to meet the day’s demands

For we do not come static

to any task, nor do we come

with a collected stash of virtue

to test ourselves against what is required

We come to grow, we come to change,

we come to learn,

we come to be made new,

to be transformed,

and more than what we make

with wood and nails and stone,

this will be our building,

this will be our home.

©Wendy Mulhern

September 24, 2019

Circuitous

Well, a straight path

to any goal

is either an illusion,

or the path and goal

were made by someone else,

and so the goal itself

is really not a goal

We must be kind

both to ourselves and anyone who’s striving —

no one arrives without

what could be seen as setbacks —

there probably was really not

a better way to go,

and where we went

(and where they went)

is also probably

not what it looks like

to anyone observing from outside

That’s what I tell myself

about our roof —

so many storms, so many leaks,

so many temporary measures

which made their own troubles,

until we finally — let’s hope it’s sometime soon —

arrive at where our house is safe and dry.

©Wendy Mulhern

September 23, 2019

Necessities

I didn’t brush my teeth last night,

didn’t write a poem either —

daily necessities overridden

by the black rolling of roof underlayment

racing against darkness and the predicted rain,

and no motivation to cook by lantern light

and all the restaurants closed or far away

I didn’t write a poem last night

or brush my teeth either —

just crawled in bed,

but all is well —

everything is still here in the morning.

©Wendy Mulhern

September 22, 2019

Meaning

With infinite patience

I’m brought round again

to learn the new meanings

which are the old meanings

from before the world began

I will learn them

here in the calm of late afternoon,

here in the rain washed, sun graced moments

when the turkeys wander back

from across the field

and crickets sing softly

and grasshoppers click

This isn’t something

I could ever learn alone,

and the great wonder is,

I don’t have to.

©Wendy Mulhern

September 19, 2019

Answering the Call

At the call of rain

so much green springs eager —

it doesn’t calculate

its prospects for the season,

whether it will become

a spreading plant or just a small sprout —

the rain has summoned it

so up it comes.

©Wendy Mulhern

September 18, 2019

Seeing the Light

The lights are everywhere.

I see them, at times,

like chinks between the trees,

like smiles of pleasure and of recognition,

and at times like moonlight across fields,

silvery joy, opalescent peace

Sometimes I see them falling —

raindrops searching our their pathways,

sometimes I see them rising —

vapor in the morning sun,

in all the ways that they appear,

the same in essence,

ever called by hope,

answered in presence.

©Wendy Mulhern

September 17, 2019

Between the rains

The rain has given us a break —

we work in silence,

finding it more harmonious

than the questions and projections

that would otherwise fill up the space

No need to annoy each other,

no need to talk about the things we cannot know.

After the window closes,

we’ll do the next thing that makes sense,

taking in the necessary factors

that will reveal themselves by then.

©Wendy Mulhern

September 16, 2019

Believe

When I turned around to look at it,

I saw that I could not have seen

what I did not believe —

much as I wanted to believe it,

I really didn’t,

or I would not have missed it

It brings to question

what I believe now,

and if I now believe,

what that enables me to see

I see this day,

I see the peace in it —

what I may see tomorrow

is not for me to say

It will unfold

along the lines of my attention —

as I hold my source and center clear,

I’ll know.

©Wendy Mulhern

September 14, 2019

Home Within

You come home to yourself

and you may realize

you didn’t need to play those games

of measuring, of shoring yourself up,

you didn’t need to feel attacked or slighted

The clarity you felt in moments

when you saw another from the inside,

when you understood a way of moving

in centered calm and mastery —

That’s you — and it can lead you 

safely through the clouds of doubt,

it can deliver you

before you even fall into confusion

It is you, and you can stay there,

secure in what you ever more will be,

home in yourself, and royal

all along the colored roads of life.

©Wendy Mulhern

September 13, 2019

In the midst

And if I ask myself

the reason for my joy,

I may consider how we breathe beauty

in sight and scent and sound,

and how we work humble —

ready to serve and learn,

and how in all this

(constant as cricket song)

we are borne up

by the presence we’re coming to recognize

as our own,

as it is given us

in the midst of every day.

©Wendy Mulhern

September 12, 2019

A New Day

Day dawns,

rain gone

(if for a moment)

sun flirts with wind,

clouds glint and grin

We free a dove

that trapped itself

in our young cherry tree’s enclosure,

I try the spirits

and today it’s clearer

whence they hail

These things do not depend

on weather, or on any gods

society has shaped and propped up,

they don’t depend on how we felt

or what we said and did

It is the Spirit

that sustains us,

breathing what we are

into our consciousness,

planting the clarity of our cause

into our frames.

©Wendy Mulhern

September 10, 2019

Rainy

I let myself fill up with rain.

It was an indulgence,

not something to sustain,

not something I have time for

in the day to day,

while the various buckets

we put under leaks

register their irregular

pticks and clangs and taps,

and hope seems to be leaking, too

We will get through this —

our source of strength does not depend

on all things rosy.

It will show itself steady,

well able to overcome

both internal and external rain.

©Wendy Mulhern

September 9, 2019

Bending

The straight line of our intent

begins to meet the season’s curve —

bracken fern starting to turn,

and trees along the river

Garden plants have given up,

the coming rain too late,

other factors we can’t see

informing them

their time of growth is over

No longer can we count on

stretches of long, sunny days —

they shorten, and the rains

begin to take their place

We will bend, because we have to,

we will find a way,

our intent will weave itself in,

for the circle belongs to us, too.

©Wendy Mulhern

September 8, 2019

The object of our hope

What we’ve been taught to hope for

is so paltry, so far from being able

to deliver satisfaction, that it’s surprising

that we feel so disappointed

when those hopes are not fulfilled

If someone told you,

You can have the sky,

and free flight in it,

you ca have fellowship

with all the thought, with all the music,

you can sing color and dance

the whole kaleidoscope of pattern,

would you believe them?

If someone told you,

You can be the love

that comprehends and celebrates

every small and large

impulse of being,

you can be the love that nurtures,

that engenders joy and exaltation,

would you embrace that hope?

Here is the voice telling you all that.

You don’t have to say if you believe it —

only notice if you want it.

That, eventually, will be clue enough.

©Wendy Mulhern

September 7, 2019

Watching the Weather

Standing under the porch roof

I aimed my camera

and tried to catch a lightening bolt

I failed, though I saw five of them

— lack of faith, perhaps,

in my ability, or in the likelihood

that it would strike again

Wind brought the smell of rain

(though it rained little)

and relief, if for the moment,

from the sultry stillness

and the thickness

of the thunder-laden air

To have a roof over our heads

is cause for gratitude,

which marks how far we’ve come

and gives a standpoint from which

we can receive more.

©Wendy Mulhern

September 5, 2019

Recognition

We will know more of each other

as we meet in Spirit,

more of our hearts, more of our sparks,

more of our flights, our home, our satisfaction

We will know more of the land, too —

what it needs, what it gives,

who it shelters

All things grow richer as we’re rarified,

as we shift our cause/effect allegiance

to where our source lies.

©Wendy Mulhern

September 4, 2019

The Putative Journey

Sometimes it seems

there is so far to go,

so much to learn, so much to purge,

so many constructs to wean myself from

Sometimes I glide along

thinking how close I am

to my arrival, thinking

how far I’ve come,

how comprehensive

my transformation has been thus far

And then I see

how much I’m missing,

how vast the chasm

between my understanding and the truth

Good thing it isn’t up to me!

Good thing my life is held

in beautiful unfolding

where no partial understanding,

no faulty sense of needing to arrive

has any traction.

©Wendy Mulhern

September 3, 2019

Re-vision

Retile my past —

take all those broken squares,

those incomplete perceptions,

those ways I failed to see

the truth of being,

so I can understand

through present windows

that nothing in my life was ever missing

Is not this grace —

what wipes away without a trace

the meted consequence,

all our indebtedness?

— and in its place

reveals the fruit that waits

ready to satisfy

when it is seen.

©Wendy Mulhern

September 2, 2019

At the work site

How does it feel

to be a crayon among nails?

Your purpose distinct

but immeasurably far

from the other ones sharing the pocket

Your substance, which never could manage

to do what a nail does,

is suited for doing a thing that they never could do —

they will sink into wood and remain there,

you’ll leave your mark on the surface and stay where you are

There will be times

when the hand reaches in

and picks out the nails one by one,

but at other times,

it will reach through their sharpness

leaving them, searching for you.

©Wendy Mulhern

September 1, 2019