Ripping the Veil

If stars are pinpricks 

in the sheet of night,

if everywhere there is a tear

reveals a burst of light,

if every glimpse of truth

calls forth a clearer sight,

let’s look again to see 

what things are made of

Across the waves, across the sky,

in every blink between the views,

there is a place where we can try

to change the focus, find new clues

To rip the veil, to see beyond

the playbook written for our lives,

to where the wonder cracks the seams

and wells up in our hearts and minds,

and from our gait within the rhythmic beat

we have to stop

because this life is far more brilliant

than what we could describe.

©Wendy Mulhern

January 25, 2020

Sight

I give my eyes to Truth.

Truth, train my eyes,

in this and every moment —

let me see straight

Catch me before my eyes

connect the dots in some distorted way,

before they draw conclusions

from some vapid, hapless picture —

help me behold unfolding acts of grace

and hidden harmony,

let them spring up before me,

showing me the universe of good

And if I haven’t seen them yet,

let me hold on, unfazed,

let me hold out for Truth’s appearing

in its own timeless rhythm

throughout my days.

©Wendy Mulhern

August 31, 2019

Fruit

Two crows fly in tandem

like double vision

till their landing,

geese speak like hinges creaking,

and run when chased,

reluctant to take flight

I wrap my mind around the whole day —

there may be tricks of light

but reality rests in every plane,

on every surface,

heavy like ripe fruit

ready to drop to my touch,

ready to be tasted.

©Wendy Mulhern

September 27, 2018

Visions

The man said he saw himself as paint

spread out over the landscape,

he saw himself as if dissolved

but didn’t care

I saw myself as the hills themselves,

and the trees on them, thrusting into sky,

I saw myself as flight itself, as song glide,

comprising all the realm my consciousness could span

I saw myself known, in the sharing of space

with others as vast and as free,

I saw myself knowing them

sweetly and intimately

When we come back with these visions,

what shall we do? How shall we live

in these things that we know to be true?

— Live in the vision, live from the vision,

bring it more clearly in view.

©Wendy Mulhern

September 16, 2018

New Vision

It’s not an ace in the hole,

it's not a way to win in this world,

it can’t be used to gain advantage

When you emerge into the radiance

of the great and tender Allness, 

you forget those things anyway,

being so caught up

in the unfolding singularity

of each joy-touched moment,

each amazing new awareness

You won’t be able to look back and measure,

but you won’t care, either,

leaving the false for the true.

©Wendy Mulhern

May 6, 2018

Lattice Work

And I am suddenly

looking through the lattice work

of what I had intensely studied,

seeing new views, an opening out in the distance,

the way the structured pattern frames

things it doesn’t even touch,

the way those things

have a life of their own,

dimension and movement far beyond

the frame through which I view them,

a frame which, just a glance before,

I had thought was the only thing to look at.

©Wendy Mulhern

February 2, 2018

Gathering Light

Where two or three are gathered

we can do the work we couldn’t do alone —

we can see each other holy,

we can see each other whole

When so resolved to be the truth’s beholders,

our eyes can lock and concentrate the light —

we form a crystal pact that leaves no room for darkness,

we look on everything with deeper sight

And so is ushered in our knowing

of the living power, so we are transformed,

the network of our caring ever growing,

as everyone who joins us here is warmed.

Though they may enter cold, 

they leave here glowing.

This is why we’re here,

this is where we’re going.

©Wendy Mulhern

January 18, 2017

Shared Vision

Like forms emerging from fog,

a feeling starts to separate

from the narratives,

a commonality 
cognized with surprise,

self-fathoming through glimpses of another

Quick connecting of the dots

until the web’s expanse is stunning

and we feel ourselves

wondrously

held in something 

whose omnipresence

renders dislocation impossible

We each came here alone,

yet, to arrive, we had to come together,

had to see each other, and how we all share

the vastness of this view,

how we have achieved

belonging through reverence.

©Wendy Mulhern

June 29, 2016

Clearer Sight

When I see you clear, I see

I don’t need to try to change anything,

don’t need to make you see, and then correct

some inner failing. In the light I see 

the shadows drop away, I see

they never had been painted on your being

When I see you clear, your light illumines

doubts within myself, helps them to fade,

so in your light I find my own redemption

as my criticism falls away

And though a rush of voices may rise up

to try to pull my thoughts back to the fray,

my clearer sight will overwhelm their story,

flood out the stridency, let peace prevail.

I lay aside the old urge to be right —

a worn out battle I don’t need to fight.

©Wendy Mulhern

May 15, 2016

Mooning

A handful of families

had come to see the blood moon,

standing around outside their cars

(like us)(children hopping around

and talking loudly)

And there it hovered

just above the trees,

just around its maximum shadow —

a smudge, a smile, a whisper

But every day has something singular —

a dance of clouds, a curve of leaves —

and every night holds out the opportunity

for moon, for stars, whatever brightness

the city’s glow may let come through.

Many people raved over this one

on the internet.

We got back in our car

and drove home.

©Wendy Mulhern

September 28, 2015

Storymongers

The incident is immediately

thronged by storymongers,

elbowing each other for your time

Some offer blame,

some offer quests,

some offer juicy roles —

the martyr, the oppressed

Any one will take you

down a convoluted path,

offering light 

just around the next corner

Some may offer softer rides,

some may promise more intense life lessons,

Each of them will swear

they are the only way,

None of them, however, will deliver

The one thing that can give you what you need

gives it quite clear — apparent from the start —

the cleansing waves of light across your brow,

the steady flow of truth into your heart

Stay open, and resist the stories,

urgent and compelling though they seem —

Hold out instead for comprehensive vision

and rise, thereby awakened from the dream.

©Wendy Mulhern

September 26, 2015

Gifts of Light

Light dances in memory —

Images form from ripples

Under closed eyes

Scenes resolve, dissolve

All the harvest of the day’s sights

jostle and arrange themselves, 

parade

brightly down the path

that leads to dream,

weavings of pictures

forming themselves into story,

crafting a narrative

for the ambient sounds

There is joy in this,

Joy in the surfeit of beauty

that springs from each frame

of my eyes —

Everything, all day long,

So rich to look on,

Plenty to pour through my vision,

enchanting me 

all through the night.

©Wendy Mulhern

July 18, 2014

Transfiguration

It is good for us to be here,

and whatever we have brought —

our child fears, our defenses,

our adult masks, our opinions,

the scaffolding on which we’ve propped

our wobbly sense of worth —

Whatever we have brought

can sit here in this light

of what we’ve glimpsed within each other.

It can sit in that warmth,

bask in the slowly suffusing fact

that it’s forgiven. All of it.

We will fill with light till that’s all

we can see in each other,

and we will be whole.

©Wendy Mulhern

December 4, 2013

Discernment

If I can see this fog

then I can see

it isn’t that you’re blurred

and indistinct,

it isn’t that you’re dull and distant.

I can separate

the vibrancy of you

from that illusion.

I can see

there is no need

to find a way to brighten you

or to discard you

due to lack of color.

I can let my understanding

lift my vision

till the fog disperses

and I see you clear.

©Wendy Mulhern

November 14, 2013

Glimpses

How can you describe the glimpsing of this truth?

You see it like a deer in the woods,

suddenly revealed by a shift in shadow,

Then it’s gone —

Gone to your eyes at least —

You know it’s there,

and if you focus in just right

you’re sure you’ll see it.

You see it like a color —

white-rimmed mauve upon the water,

flickering and disappearing

till you find its source

in the sunset sky

and then you see it

repeated in great swaths across the lake.

It’s like a snatch of song

So sweet and haunting to your inward ear

But which you can’t quite hum

because you don’t quite know it.

Wait. Be still. You’ve called for it

And so, in its time, it will come.

©Wendy Mulhern

September 19, 2013

Refuge

I’m putting down roots,

finding anchor

against the dizzy winds,

the strident lying stories

that have swirled us all our lives

as we tried to find meaning

in the vague continuity

offered by their endless repetition.

In the stillness of groundedness

the winds seem harder

but they serve to reinforce

the sense of refuge,

the place of home,

the finding of the solid truth on which I stand,

the rock from which I now shall not be moved.

©Wendy Mulhern

August 27, 2013

Designing

It’s a funny thing

that I could so totally inhabit another world

as to make a double exposure

for my eyes:

Though I am driving here

along these roads, against these skies,

I also breathe papaya

and avocado

and sheets of rain arrested in their slide

down a humid landscape,

and cool tile floors offering respite

And if there is a way

to really harness this power,

we’ll be off and away,

making things real,

bringing one or more new worlds

into the light of actual day.

©Wendy Mulhern

August 13, 2013

Butterflies

(notes on the second summer five-women gathering)

Let us melt

into the soft, orgasmic

surrender

where everything that we’ve accumulated —

the triumphs and the woes,

the stories of what’s happened,

the win and lose of what we have become —

dissolve into imaginal potential

for our metamorphosis

into our own.

What we have called a false start

or called a failure,

or called a choice that didn’t do us good,

all serve as food for our unfoldment,

unmarred by scars from anything we’ve done.

Here in this company

we feel our wings expanding

just like our hearts

that hold each other whole —

the selves we own

by seeing them reflected

in kindred eyes that shine the light of Soul.

©Wendy Mulhern

August 10, 2013

My Final Offer

There is no part of my desire

that I’m willing to give up.

I insist on all the goodness

that I crave:

The part about the living land

and our deep kinship with it;

The part about our well-honed gifts

and all the richness shared in their fruition;

The part about our home

and all the others who live with us;

The part about the healing of the earth;

All these must be included

in the goodness we acquire,

No part may be excluded from the vision.

I won’t agree to any less

and so it must be given.

©Wendy Mulhern

June 27, 2013

Ark Building

We have our instructions:

In the face of great violence,

build an ark.

So much violence in the land,

no one is even talking about it —

afraid, as they may be,

of bringing down the wrath upon their heads,

lulled, as they may be,

by the vehemence of misdirecting tales

Violence to the land,

Violence to the people,

Violence to their structures of support:

Build an ark.

Make it out of circles of our arms,

Make is out of clear communication,

Make it from the habit

of open-hearted caring,

Make it with room for everyone

Make it out of work that serves the earth,

that builds the chains of life supporting life,

Make it from our trueness,

Make it with our hearts,

Make it from the clearness of our vision.

Build the ark.

Let all the creatures in —

No point in a war against the violence —

As we build, our worth will lift us up

Upon the sea that reconfigures all.

©Wendy Mulhern

June 23, 2013