Synergy

And after the effort

we notice the lift of synergy,

the filling out and up 

of so many unfolding layers

of expressiveness

with momentum like

white foam after the wave breaks

rushing up the beach

and bathing everything

in its soft fizz,

like flowers unfurling in time lapse,

like stars unendingly appearing

along the zoom toward infinity

We put so much in

but what we got out is even more.

©Wendy Mulhern

September 9, 2017

Ties

If everyone could be

wrapped in  the arms of family,

if they could all feel

there is a place for them to be

where they know they are

at home in each other’s homes,

known by each other’s fathers

and mothers and children,

then everyone would also know

the most important way to be —

everyone would know how to be kind.

©Wendy Mulhern

September 8, 2017

At Heart

I sometimes feel

I don’t know

what things are made of anymore,

don’t understand

how people live,

what they do behind their doors,

how they afford to be there, 

how they fill their days,

how they find a way

to make it all work

And then sometimes I get a chance to see

the grand complexity of someone else’s life —

the trials and hurdles, 

joys and satisfaction,

with what they’ve made their lives

and what they have been given

And there I see the way

that we are all the same,

however different our paths have been —

we radiate our fervor from the same source,

we share, at heart, the same core.

©Wendy Mulhern

September 7, 2017

Last Ride of Summer

I rest in the smug comfort

of intermittent torrential showers,

as I have already reaped

from the day

a magnificent ride

Cormorant swallowing a fish,

mourning dove perching on a wire,

houses of the towns pert and clean,

sun almost emerging from the clouds

The crash of wild high tide surf,

the thrill of strongly tugging water,

sun sheen emerging

at the height of drama,

sand and wind and soft sea foam

Flat high-topped clouds just whispered

of the chance of future thunder —

I drank in all the glory

to fill my morning hunger

Then I returned. Two hours later

rain descended, 

making lakes of roads approaching five corners,

thunder rumbling high across the sky,

me content and gleeful to be dry.

©Wendy Mulhern

September 6, 2017

Trust Moment

It is a soft space

this place where we have

folded and fallen,

where shadows soften

all around us

and our edges

blur in darkness

There are things here

I can’t talk about to anyone

though I keep trying to imagine who

There is a place where

we have breathed together

and this will have to do,

I will need to be sustained

through the long silence

by some kind of a trust moment —

at its necessary time

everything will come clear.

©Wendy Mulhern

September 3, 2017

Reframing

Save me from the cobwebs

of these stories,

save me from the crazed crack mazes,

save me from wandering, once again,

down these tired paths

to their mindless ends,

living these same frames 

over and over, reaching the same conclusions

There is no need to live like this —

if I don’t like where these paths end

I don’t need to start down them.

If I don’t want to dwell in miry stuckness

I can refuse to take it in

If I want to live in light,

this is where I must begin.

Those worn out stories

can tell themselves to themselves.

It isn’t blindness

to lift my head,

it isn’t cheating

to choose a different place to play.

©Wendy Mulhern

September 2, 2017

Like Water

I let my being stream

like water through a net,

I let my being rest

like water in a pool.

There’s nothing to hang up on

and nothing to defend,

there is no need for perturbation

True, there may be pebbles cast,

there may be large rocks

and woody springs,

there may be turbulence within the flow,

there may be eddies, there may be dams

But that which keeps welling up

still bears the character

of its source, remains tributary

to that which calls it forth,

retains its essence

in every place it’s found,

unchanging as it moves throughout the ground.

©Wendy Mulhern

September 1, 2017