Facing Down the Dragon

The fact that I wrote something

doesn’t mean I really know it,

and even when I feel

within my deepest core

(Lord, I believe)

something is true,

it doesn’t mean I really understand

But coming round again and again,

things start to get clearer

(Help thou mine unbelief)

and eventually the swollen, writhing tail

must cease to sweep away the stars,

must fall, jellied and lifeless 

as a tail a lizard lost,

before the hand of Truth.

©Wendy Mulhern

November 5, 2015

Going Through

The way through

will never be

what we were told it was.

This is a truth

known by storytellers

and by anyone who,

in rebellion or in great anguish,

leaves the rules behind,

the map, too,

and loses herself

in the present communion

with the true terrain —

every ridge and gully,

every rock formation,

the sharp and the smooth,

the solid, the crumbling,

and the requirements

of each footfall 

For it is only these steps,

singular and stumbling

that gain the beloved land.

©Wendy Mulhern

November 4, 2015

Winds of Peace

No, I will not dip one toe

into the roil of fear —

I know how it could take me,

throw me off balance,

spin me under, with its fiercening demands

and not deliver me

(the way that it had promised)

to the other side —

It can’t be forded

and I can’t afford it

I will ride instead

along the winds of peace,

the billowing uplift

that holds my soul

in tender balance,

that fills my heart,

gradual as the dawn,

with the clear perception

that all is well.

©Wendy Mulhern

November 3, 2015

Dried Pea Wars

Truth is too big

to have a brand,

Truth is too big

to be packaged.

Truth is far bigger

than any versus — mine vs. yours,

ours vs. theirs

Every sense of truth

that wars against another’s

is like a small person

throwing dried peas

against a window —

the insignificant ptick ptick

will have no impact

There will be no time even

to call them to justice —

They will be swept away

like so much flotsam

And the clean rush

of the Truth that is One

will cover everything —

that will be enough.

©Wendy Mulhern

November 1, 2015

Reasoning

After the convulsive flex of fear,

we come back, we take stock,

and we see

there is nothing we can stand on

except what we have always known,

nothing we can flee to

except the truth

If Life planned to destroy us,

it would have done so a long time ago.

If Life could destroy us

it wouldn’t exist

for it would have discarded

the love-cohesion

that holds things together.

It couldn’t make a universe

without being Love,

and it couldn’t be Love

without cherishing each of us.

What Love cherishes,

it can’t destroy,

so we are safe,

as is every being

that moves in the grand circles

that constitute everything.

This is the truth we stand on.

Fear couldn’t find it for us,

and fear can’t take it away.

©Wendy Mulhern

October 31, 2015

Heritage

On your shoulders,

no weight of generations,

on your head

no folly of past years,

no unredeemed misunderstanding,

harbored, confusedly,

by your parents, your grandparents,

theirs —

You are born of this day,

fresh as a swift cloud

after showers,

sailing through storm washed blue

with its answering catch of breath

You are born in this moment,

ever inheriting

the bright conception

that creates itself constantly,

building the whole timeless universe

in every inspiration,

embracing it all, right now,

embracing you.

©Wendy Mulhern

October 29, 2015

I Shall Be Clean

Well, I can’t purify myself

and I can’t improve my state of mind,

can’t add a cubit to my stature,

can’t fix myself, can’t fix another

But I can appeal

to the ageless order of being

that sings through winds,

that plays through rain,

that blows the scent of oceans

up majestic mountains,

that brings the scent of snow back down

I can appeal

to what twines together

the intricate lacings of life,

the waves of movement,

the harmony of breath

There is a knowing

before which my own concepts

are rendered silent.

Dip me in seven times

and I’ll be clean.

©Wendy Mulhern

October 28, 2015