To the men in my life

There’s room for you here —

There’s room for that way you walk,

all business and purpose,

room for your boyish confidence

and your sweetness

and how you desire to trust deeply,

There’s room for your enthusiasm

and your eager joining in

The boy in you

who never grows up

will win the day every time

because he is ever willing

to give his whole large heart

for the rush of joy

in having it received.

©Wendy Mulhern

July 8, 2015

Equation

In the new equation,

motivation can no longer

be considered in terms of leverage

(incentives, consequences,

how to get someone to do something)

In the new equation

we may think in terms of lift —

lift of our collective wings,

mid-flight discovery

of our shared volition

where we don’t know

before we swoop

precisely where we’re going,

where the perfection

of the emergent direction

is the product

of the perfection of each of us,

and how we’re made to fly together

And none of us will need to be director —

We’ll all be listeners,

we’ll all be followers

of the wisdom that arises from our love.

©Wendy Mulhern

July 7, 2015

Lavender

Just as my body sighed

with the heat of the hill climb

I was met with lavender

singing with its scent

about early morning watering

and gratitude for its essence

and the day

How could I not join in

as welcome wind brings high clouds

and a hint of change

and everything dances what it feels

and what it knows.

©Wendy Mulhern

July 6, 2015

Touching Ground

Now and again in flashes

I get this image:

My foot touching ground

for the first time,

the knowledge of contact

flowing back into me

up the curve of my calf,

my knee,

I feel its echo down my arm

as if my arm had never

up till now

been really here

And I sense 

that this discovery

is what I have always needed

to move with power in the world,

to be whole.

©Wendy Mulhern

July 5, 2015

Liberated

Though you may carry your shame

in your posture,

though you may exude

the helpless unhappiness

that shows you feel

your body has not been your friend,

though you feel bullied

by its insistence on exposing

your ungainly softness,

making you a target for rejection

Though you have also hidden

behind your flesh,

made it a fortress

behind which you hope

to be invisible,

You can’t hide your glorious light

You are a marvel —

your sensitivity, your fine desires,

your tender hopes, your latent

tendrils of affection

are intricate and precious,

and if the world isn’t worthy

of your gifts,

it still needs them

and will be profoundly liberated

as you set yourself free.

©Wendy Mulhern

July 4, 2015

Third of July

It is a day of no obligations

and no great ambitions

and enough heat to arrest

in mid stride

most anything we might try

Yet we have managed

to do a few things

and get some water

to our seedling dreams

and as the blessed coolness

stirs the evening,

we will sleep well

and grow a little newer.

©Wendy Mulhern

July 3, 2015

My Gift

In the clutter of the stories

I’m prone to tell myself,

there is danger of getting lost

This time I check myself

against the gravity

of how this offering

will feel to you

I check its underside

for hints of instruction

(which might imply

I thought you needed change)

I check to see if its assertions

are made from wish fulfillment

on my part

Nothing but my pure love

is worthy of you.

Nothing but my pure love

is worthy of me.

©Wendy Mulhern

July 2, 2015