Sovereignty

 

I'm not afraid of end days,
because I'm learning
that succumbing to the story
would entail an abdication
that I will not do

I will not allow time
to roll like a wheel,
I will not assume that anything
just happens

I am learning sovereignty
over what moves in thought,
I am learning
what doesn't more in thought
doesn't move at all

I will stand strong
in my place with what's unfolding,
my steps on earth continually
approaching heaven.

©Wendy Mulhern
May 31, 2021

Pause

 

I will agree
to not go backward.
We can pause, we can rest  -
that's good - it lets all the ripples
catch up to us, it lets
the consequences of our revelation
settle into place

It is well to take the time to celebrate
the new green, the new calm,
the ready place for long waiting seeds
to swell and sprout, and start to branch
into new understanding

It is not going backward
to take all this in -
it's just allowing time for new hope
to bear its tender fruit.

©Wendy Mulhern
May 30, 2021

Softening

 

In this moment of afternoon

I walk in quiet wonder
through a subtle quality - the day
softened by tears,
softened by sweet conversation
that went on last night long after dark,
softened by the relief of finding a next step
out of a tight place

There are fewer words in my head,
and that is softer,
and the sun and breeze are softening each other,
and we can have direction
without being driven,
and we can have this day,
uninfluenced by time.

©Wendy Mulhern
May 29, 2021

Sun-like

 

I watched how the sun
sifted through the firs,
how it dappled the eager forbs,
stretching out long
after months as ground cover

I felt how the warmth was bestowed
in the precise places where the sun hit,
and I considered how precise
my thought must also be,
to pick out truth
and not slop over into lies,
and how sun-like this practice really is,
the bright places and the shadows
all basking in the overflow of grace.

©Wendy Mulhern
May 27, 2021

On the non-intelligence of evil

 

When presented with good,
evil, actually, can't even remember
what it was thinking

It can string impressions together
in the echo of itself against itself,
in the escalation of provocation

It can lance forward
with its narrative of
good as the other edge of itself
(self righteous and indignant)
as that which justifies its bellicosity

But good - real good, pure good,
the one that never justifies
and never is provoked,
that always wishes well
and always blesses -

Evil can't stand before it,
because, in the face of good,
it can't think of anything,
can't imagine what, besides good,
it could have wanted.
In the face of good,
evil drops itself entirely,
and we reach out, innocent,
to take the prize.

©Wendy Mulhern
May 26, 2021

Droplets

 

Could be teardrops,
could be raindrops,
could be the tiniest kiss of cream
as we come toward the end
of this puddled afternoon
with a cup of coffee
and some small pools of hope
scattered and deflected
like droplets on my glasses,
and we will be OK,
yes, ultimately,
we will be just fine.

©Wendy Mulhern
May 25, 2021

Resolution

 

We pick ourselves up,
we bumble forward.
There is little to be gained
by second-guessing

But much is gained
by reassessing
what we are here for,
what powers our days

Let's have no more irreverence
where reverence is due,
no more complaining,
no dogged powering through,
more cheerful patience,
more open gratitude,
and all in all,
more closeness to our source.

©Wendy Mulhern
May 24, 2021

Baptism of repentance

 

I was wrong for so long,

wedged tightly in the certainty
that I was right,
convinced by all the evidence
and all the arguments I made
inside my head

I was wrong for so long,
it takes some decompression
ro come out, it takes some silence,
it takes some tears,
it takes some awe, for this is not
the flipping of a coin,
this is abandoning the coin
and all its systems

This is seeing that I do not pay
by being punished,
but by giving myself fully
to the effort to see truly
and to let no condemnation
contaminate my thought

This is seeing that I pay
with my whole being,
endlessly, and purely, and with gratitude.

©Wendy Mulhern
May 23, 2021

The Flight Ahead

 

No, you can't go back
into that egg, little bird.
Consider the rush of wind,
the beat of wings, the power
of the updraft. Consider
the glide, the taut curve
that held you and the air
in that exquisite relation,
the slight turn of feathers
that let you carve the sky

You really don't want to go back
to being passive, helpless, dark -
you really don't wish to not know anything
but some obscure external warmth
and some small flutter
of potentiality

Though it may seem
that the migration that awaits is long,
and that the wind grows cold
and you are all alone,
great arcs of grace await you
all along the way -
you'll  be escorted by the knowledge
of many generations. More importantly,
you are discovering,
each flight filled day
just what you are.

©Wendy Mulhern
May 21, 2021

Misstep

 

I stand in the sting of my misstep
as it rings through me,
an orienting of straight lines
like rain I could stand in,
like rays of light at my periphery

My dream warned me of this,
and I knew what it meant,
but I didn't summon the strength
to stand up with it,
didn't make the effort
to change my course

So now, what is left
is my contrition
and my willingness
to transcend all these frames
and seek a surer guidance
for my feet.

©Wendy Mulhern
May 20, 2021

To the bereaved father whose image i saw on Facebook

 

In the yearning to do more for you
than cry and cry,
I asked my angel daughter
to go to you,
to deliver you to the large place
she showed me,
where you can meet your daughter,
and she can laugh with you,
and your tears will change,
in the alchemy that changes everything,
in the equation that cancels out pain and death,
and they will be like sweet morning dew
at the dawn of eternal day.

©Wendy Mulhern
May 19, 2021

Being, Doing

 

If what I am
is really so much larger
than what I have been trained
to think myself to be

If, rather than corporeal,
my essence finds its home
where it can handily traverse infinity

Then what I do must also be defined,
not in the bumbling mortal mode
in which I've moved,
but in the way that holds the reins of winds
and witnesses the quality of days,
the way that holds the space for liberty to bloom,
and every entity to find its radiant room.

©Wendy Mulhern
May 18, 2021

Tasting Color

 

I sample tips of douglass fir,
taste the subtle variation  -
sweeter, sharper, more of lemon

or of resin - I taste, I taste,
but do not choose

It is like colors  - I taste,
in my mind, a bright dark crimson,
then imagine taking it a shade towards peach,
I see the sheen the two set up,
interleaved, like early spring's red maples,
I draw a line of deep slate indigo
to set the red off boldly, to vibrate
along the border

But, also, I can love the summer
of crimson into amber,
the warm delicious tones stirred up
through the transition
And green  - I can't even begin
to speak of green's delights -
the luminescence of back-lit leaves,
the soothing shading of the summer firs

I'll taste, I'll taste,
but no, I will not choose -
each color needs all of the others,
and I need color in my sight and mind
to paint the glory of each light-blessed day.

©Wendy Mulhern
May 17, 2021

Evening, pre-poem

 

I sit quiet, waiting
for something to say -
all I hear are the now-subdued sounds
that continue into evening  -
the high bleat of the towhees,
blackbirds with their jewel-toned songs

A while ago, I saw a turkey hen
walking home, sampling evening bugs
among the ferns. Now I hear one fly
from tree to tree

The wind has quieted, the sun has gone,
coolness starts to reassert itself.
Some cars, or maybe motorcycles,
are rumbling up a distant street,
but that's part of another world.

©Wendy Mulhern
May 16, 2021

Shrouds

 

Go ahead and take it down -
however proud of it you may have been,
however much you thought you needed it

Go ahead and take it down,
though you have counted it as your own,
like a tattoo, or something deeply etched

It may have markings of your status,
high or low, or what you've earned,
it may be tied up in how others see you,
but go ahead and take it down

Old tatters or a rich brocade,
the colors and the tallies of the teams you played,
the records of your triumphs and mistakes you've made -
you'll be much freer when you take it down

The shroud removed, the light comes streaming in,
you feel the air anew, and you can breathe again,
as life unlimited fills up the waiting plain
at every place the shroud is taken down.

©Wendy Mulhern
May 15, 2021

May

 

The newly leafed out aspens
shimmer their leaves in the wind,
the newly planted lindens do the same,
May sweeps across the dial like a sun,
opening everything

Bracken ferns leap up,
suddenly taller than six year old trees,
irises unfurl, and glow, and curl,
berry blossoms peak among the leaves

It is a time to realign
our sense of what's important  -
thoughts like old stalks overcome
by the rising green,
old habits crumbling
like last year's  bracken,
new strength maturing
like the wakened trees.

©Wendy Mulhern
May 14, 2021

The Old Maple

 

This is proof
that there is no arc of death,
that death is not a place
where life ends up

This is proof that life
is always what's here to notice  -
that in spite of death sentences,
life is what speaks to us

Before, it seems, all we could notice
was that the tree was dying,
but now, each spring, each year,
we celebrate persistent life -
these leaves, as fresh as ever,
coming out gracious
beside the hollowing trunk.

©Wendy Mulhern
May 12, 2021

Before Sundown

 

The sun will be laughing at us,
as it goes down, for all the things
we missed doing today,
although we were working straight along,
sun-roasted, wind-cooled, not stopping
to rest or eat

The sun will be laughing
but we will be laughing too,
for we did well, planting trees, not stopping
till we wanted to sink into sleep,
and we came into town
and got what we needed,
and may even get home
before the sun goes down.

©Wendy Mulhern
May 11, 2021

Distance

 

The path at this point
turns out not to be
an easy one to explain

I've gone too far
through the wilderness
for a facile reference
to register

(which means I see
you don't know
what I'm talking about)

I would have to take you along
the whole history of my journey
or lead you through the whole logic
that comes to this conclusion

Or otherwise, I guess
it's just better for me
not to talk about it much.

©Wendy Mulhern
May 9, 2021

What I'm good for

 

I start to see
that what's forbidden
is a directionality -
seeking out what's good for me

And that what satisfies
inclines the other way -
I find myself in seeking
what I'm good for

And what I'm good for
is being what I am,
and what I am
bears witness to what's true,
and what is true is Life -
its uncontainable exuberance,
and Life is what I love,
and what loves me.

©Wendy Mulhern
May 7, 2021

Intimate

 

In the most intimate place
where all the entrances are so small
most sensors don't pick them up

In the most secret place
which you have fiercely guarded,
sensing the precious essence
that lies within...

If you touch that smallest place
you tap your power,
for concentrated there
you find infinity

And what is infinite
will always well up,
an eternal spring -
ever-renewing,
and therefore always pure

You will never fear,
once you have understood
what dwells most small, 
most intimate, within.

©Wendy Mulhern
May 6, 2021

As darkness gathers

 

I ask myself, why should I be tempted
with sorrow? - as light rain joins with dusk
to dim the sky, and I walk down to cook supper
while I can still see a little,
and before everything gets fully wet

Why should I let this unnamed mesh
put up a catchment for impending tears?
- while I hold back reasons, noticing
that one or several
could launch me into self-indulgent sadness

It is written
that sorrow has its reward,
that if kept honest
(free of self pity's stories)
it makes a basin to receive comfort  -
comfort flowing in, cascading
all over the rims,
filling me up with acknowledgement  -
how infinite its source!

©Wendy Mulhern
May 3, 2021

As Spirit Breathes

 

Since everything is Spirit-breathed,
nothing is unchosen -
the breath of Life moves
in its exuberance
in all you can behold

Behold  - how much love rests
in every blade of grass,
in every petal,
and all the birds and frogs
sing it out -
it's true of you, too -
it's true of all of you.

©Wendy Mulhern
May 2, 2021

Unfairy Tale

 

And if the aging princess,
well kept inside her palace
(for her protection)
all these years

Were to find her way out,
and see, on the street, whole tracts
of identical palaces,
a suburb of princesses
all locked away,
assured they were singular, royal, and precious,
what would she think?

What would she think of the ones
who had told her, each day,
how special she was?
What would she think of the system that held her, what would she think of her luxuries?
What would she think of her life and its purpose? And more importantly,
What would she do?

©Wendy Mulhern
May 1, 2021