Calm

 

And for this gift of all inclusive calm,
I thank You.
I do not thank the hurricane,
the hailstorm, the tornado,
though You have shown
that they can do no harm

It hasn't been their storming
that has brought me here,
but rather how Your presence
puts them to silence,
in this and every instance

My sense of calm grows stronger,
not because of them, but clearly
because of You. You whose calm rules,
in whose most focused love
I dwell.

©Wendy Mulhern
March 30, 2023

Always

 

I suddenly saw
the events in our lives
like the curve of the smoke of a candle -
no need to remember exactly,
no need to pin down its shape

For we have been here forever  -
before the mountains, before the earth,
and if we've ever known each other,
it follows that we always have,
and always will,
in the timeless mindfulness of being

This is the only field vast enough
to hold my love for you who I called daughter,
and you who I've called Mom -
think of us all together in boundlessness  -
what laughter! and what power!

©Wendy Mulhern
March 29, 2023

A Way

 

We walk the fields together,
and many tasks could dog us -
dropped projects, ones we haven't even started,
things that once were done
but now must be maintained

We see the green
that sprang up after snow,
we see the slope of ground,
the rise of trees

There is a way to look at all of this,
that we may master
as we practice with ourselves and with each other,
there may be
a way to harmonize all this
and see the springing grace inherent here.

©Wendy Mulhern
March 28, 2023

Flow

 

Take me, take me along
this singing rumbling tumbling flow,
and though we speak of gravity,
and though I feel it,
throughout this run
there is no foreign force exerted

All is mindful here,
from molecule to glint of light,
to leaves submerged and floating,
to swirling and cavorting waves
and branches leaning, catching

All is mindful here
and each contributes
what defines itself
and how it fills the whole.

©Wendy Mulhern
March 27, 2023

Tone

 

As my tone of thought grows firmer,
the dispiriting voices
with their barbed and stinging filaments
are exposed  -
there is less space for them to hide in semi-consciousness  -
they can no longer pose as part of me

No strings that could be pulled by foreign agents,
no voices that result in giving up,
no inclination to conceal a faulty motivation
will get to be presented as my thought

They are squeezed out
and I become more vigilant,
learning myself in the new strength that stays.

©Wendy Mulhern
March 26, 2023

Relaying

 

Even when things aren't passed down directly,
father to son, mother to daughter,
even when things that happen
tear great holes
in community, in continuity,
these threads still have a way of catching,
clasp on some level
that was never severed,
and the elixir of life
refreshes itself,
giving rise to what feels like
brand new light,
though it's been here, latent, all along.

©Wendy Mulhern
March 25, 2023

Learning myself

 

This morning I found

a breath like the taste of snow,
a satisfaction
down in a place
I didn't even know I could feel,
a way all of me moves together,
a way to not be moved at all.

©Wendy Mulhern
March 24, 2023