Entering at the door

Let me approach

with utmost respect,

with reverence for the size and shape

of the place in you

that is designed to open

You will recognize me

in our mutually reflected light —

you will let me in,

you will come out to play

We will multiply our brightness

like flames in oxygen,

like fragrant blossoms in the midday sun,

we will be fed

and we will feed each other

in the pastures of the Allness of the One.

©Wendy Mulhern

February 29, 2020

Day’s Report

The wind began to blow cold

though the day was still sunny,

and we delayed our work

and then had to persist

through windblown bands

of overcast and sun,

and after awhile

it felt good and fresh to be working

And then it started to rain 

and it started to get dark

and we kept working

till the plants were planted

and deer-protected —

less than we’d hoped

but enough to be satisfied.

When we had dried off

and started a fire

and stoked it till the cabin warmed up,

and scrounged some food

and tended to the water

we were too tired

to do anything else.

©Wendy Mulhern

February 28, 2020

Same Way

You can’t see your source,

the same way

you can’t see yourself —

it comes up from within,

it faces the same way you do —

it is your impulse, your inspiration,

nothing you can separate

in any observation

from what you are

Certain things you can see

in reflection,

but then you and your source

are both looking at the same image.

The point isn’t to try

to see it face to face,

the point is how you dance with it inside.

©Wendy Mulhern

February 27, 2020

Starting Point

I feel great peace remembering

the starting point never

gets far away —

Whatever structures

I may have erected,

whatever standpoint

I may have backed myself into,

they never dictate

my next step,

which can always start right here

with the fundamental innocence

of all life,

with the first impulse

that unites us all.

©Wendy Mulhern

February 26, 2020

Precursor

The birds seemed as happy as we were

for the return to the land,

for the spring

or its precursor,

the time of prodigious effort

we can now set to,

the time for making home

and for noticing

that it’s here.

©Wendy Mulhern

February 24, 2020

Cleanse

We may look and find the place

where fear was painted

up in the mauve underside of your scales,

making your protection prickle,

making you uneasy underneath

We will hold you so gently

as we rinse you clean,

all of that pigment

making it take a long time

till the water runs clear

You will feel it then,

the knitting together — yourself

with yourself, the relief

of the new clean place,

the integration, now that there is no foreign substance,

the power rallying within

You can rest now

and let yourself absorb

what it is to be fully you.

You’ll reach out open

to make the true connection,

the flash through you

and us

that lights the land.

©Wendy Mulhern

February 23, 2020

Feet Feels

My feet suddenly remember

how they tingle in damp grass —

my toes stretch and grasp the feeling

and I consider

taking off my socks and going out

It is as they remember —

a little colder, maybe,

and the grass bends flatter underfoot.

There are fir cones in the grass,

small birds trilling from afar,

and soft socks to return to 

in the house.

©Wendy Mulhern

February 22, 2020

Where I seek guidance

Not in a map

so much as a practice —

the practice of presence,

the practice of catching

the tiny upliftments

each moment holds —

the silent flowing,

the intricate crystalization,

the clasp of life,

always a celebration,

every living thing reprising

life’s essential properties,

joy ever being what rises

like oxygen, what fills and blesses,

what confirms my being here.

©Wendy Mulhern

February 20, 2020

The Effect of Kindness

Since my body had been

soaked in kindness,

it had no voice to complain —

it wanted to stay there

in the memory and present fact

of kindness,

where it confessed

it was eager to learn,

eager to do anything I might ask

It was willing to abandon

any tales of injury or weakness

and just stay there in the aura

the kindness had bestowed

When it next moved

it was a different body

than the one I had walked in before.

©Wendy Mulhern

February 19, 2020

Taking Root

New language arises

in the differentiation of essential oils,

in the attention to small details —

freshness and sequence and timing

There are places in this noticing

for gratitude to take hold

with confident grip

to entrances too small to see —

thread hairs of its roots

reaching in and changing the ground

with what it brings

and what it calls forth.

©Wendy Mulhern

February 18, 2020

Orange and Silk

The silk I was washing

tore in my hands like wet paper,

myriad holes appearing

in what before was whole cloth,

my innocent fingers proving themselves deadly,

hapless

The oil from the orange you described

stayed on my fingers

and my lips,

its presence in thought

so immediate, so important

Ways of seeing things fall away,

suddenly proved unable

to hold truth in them,

new images tingle,

evocative, potent,

their scent suffusing everything.

©Wendy Mulhern

February 17, 2020

Bicycle Winds

Tailwind now — enjoy your ride —

you will have headwind

on the other side,

strong gusts will blast

and beat you down

all the way along the sound

But wait — no need to prearrange —

winds make no promises —

they change,

in their direction and their force,

with no attention to  your course

See how today you are attended —

someone who the wind’s befriended,

playful with your hair,

playfully pushing you along,

freshening the air

and joining in your song

So bring that spirit home —

bring it on inside,

until the new engagement

of tomorrow’s ride.

©Wendy Mulhern

February 16, 2020

Your daily course

This is not about how you need to be,

This is about what you are.

How you need to be

is so, well, needy —

it chafes against your brows, your lungs,

it sighs, it paces,

it rides itself with a crop 

(gee up!) it stumbles forth

half hearted

What you are

is not like that —

it moves gracefully,

like light on water —

weightless, unsinking, delighted,

responsive, here to serve,

generous, whole and tender hearted,

receiving the reward of its own being.

©Wendy Mulhern

February 15, 2020

Presence

It isn’t a unifying force —

It’s much more gentle than that,

simple as sunshine, the present fact

of what’s here, of what properties

always are seen

in the way things move,

the way they interact

We can know we belong

in any here we find ourselves,

because we, too,

move like that —

gentle necessity,

the nature in which we rise.

©Wendy Mulhern

February 14, 2020

Setback

I went out shiny and hopeful,

I came back grubby and bruised,

I tripped over myself

so many times,

I got in my way —

such a familiar place

I had made grand narratives

for my triumph, had configured the words

but then found myself

once again

having to settle for silence

I know

there is another way,

I see the sweet humility

that overcomes the toughest challenge.

I feel the gratitude

for those quiet moments

where I see others

have found that peace

I can’t do this alone

but I’m not asked to,

nor am I charged to chronicle the story.

The steps are shown,

and all those dear ones

wait eager to receive me when I come.

©Wendy Mulhern

February 13, 2020

Above

And for now

I can sit like a low cloud

above the scenery,

I can be within the rain,

it can be something

that isn’t falling,

or it is, but I’m still here

There is a peace,

a suffusion of quiet glows,

a sense of being untouched

by what moves below,

letting my being be determined

not by my will or effort,

but by what moves in me

and makes me what I am.

©Wendy Mulhern

February 11, 2020

Light Traveling

In light traveling, as I slowly learn,

I must be vigilant

not to put my weight down,

not to stick my fingers

into any situation,

lest I be grabbed

and wrenched downwards,

lest I smudge and darken

my perception

In light traveling

I must hold myself

open to the wind

and to the logic of Allness,

and everything that light touches,

so I am borne up

in the fabric of everything,

so I am woven true.

©Wendy Mulhern

February 10, 2020

Shadow

I closed my eyes

and the blue violet shadow

swept over me, through me,

then its particulate

began to dissipate

but the dark specs

still shaded everything

I can see the light —

right there, in memory,

and under everything —

it will rise,

it will become

what fills my consciousness and sight.

This I know well

though I can’t feel it now.

©Wendy Mulhern

February 9, 2020

All the same

This may seem infinitely different

but it is all the same,

the binding loops of fear

are not distinct, there is no

relative virtue in the systems

that hold us down — one pathology

is just as haunting

as another

We can find comfort, then, perhaps,

in what we share,

stop putting ourselves down,

forgive each other,

and in the space that makes,

we’ll come to see

it is the same release

that frees us all.

©Wendy Mulhern

February 7, 2020

The Fruits of Waiting

A soft day —

a day for the lessons of patience,

of things still waiting in winter rain,

the colors that shine

while the brighter ones are gone

I struggled through the morning’s low

to find these — the fruits

of going slow,

slow enough to mute

any opinions

and let the inner structures

take as long as they need to

to speak for themselves.

©Wendy Mulhern

February 6, 2020

A Word for Tomorrow

Do not be dismayed

at the insanity you see —

the flagrant lies, the bland

denial of what’s known to be

This whole charade

with its elaborate displays

can only lope so far

before it topples

Do not be afraid,

for underneath the bald parade,

Life’s engine hums,

and in the end, life moves itself

the way life wants to go,

and as you nurture it,

it will bloom huge —

there is no lie it will not overthrow.

©Wendy Mulhern

February 4, 2020

One Voice

There is no part of me

that doesn’t hear

the voice that speaks my name

There is no part of me

that doesn’t answer,

grateful in remembrance,

glad to be reminded

of how I am so intimately known

My tongue prepares

gold tribute in my mouth,

my arms reach out

to hasten the embrace,

my thought body swoops

across the field in joy,

my heart body stays close,

following my breath

Amid the many clamoring voices —

dragon’s breath roar, swift dismissal —

this voice rings so clear

it claims my full attention,

these are the words

I’m happy to repeat.

©Wendy Mulhern

February 3, 2020

Art Appreciation

And if I can’t play the music

that drenches me

with the presence of beauty,

that flows down my arms

and fills my mouth

and ripples me with shimmers

from the sun

Perhaps this standing in it

is still worth something —

perhaps this gratitude

for its existence,

this rising joy, all-in reverberation

still serves a function —

gives the music someone who believes.

©Wendy Mulhern

February 1, 2020