Standing at the point of who I am,
I will not be cowed
by the arenas stretching out before me,
each one claiming
that I must take their challenge,
must imbibe the bitter fear they offer,
and the almost certain disappointment –
must be tested
and probably found wanting,
at least helpless
to see good prevail
I need not go out
from who I am –
I can bring that with me,
and as it is written,
the trees of the field
will clap their hands.
©Wendy Mulhern
April 19, 2020
The little birds, one by one,
show us the form behind their songs –
red winged blackbird, mourning dove,
song sparrow, robin, towhee
Big birds, too – the ravens
with their laughs and clicks
and loud, labored flap across the sky,
geese with their commotion,
and turkeys with their funny ways
They like things about us –
our fence, our flowers,
the puddles and the dust baths
our presence has provided
We like things about them, too –
their sounds, their swoops
and how they fill the land with life –
swift catch of joy,
warble of the heart.
©Wendy Mulhern
April 18, 2020
Gratitude for joy at end of day
glows like coals in the cabin stove.
Remembrance of green shade
and steps made,
and some kind of entrance
into conscious freedom
rests easy in the evening hours –
strength and peace for now
and for the day to come.
©Wendy Mulhern
April 17, 2020
No need to covet repentance –
There’s plenty of room for my knees
here on the ground,
here where the clods and grains of dirt
are moister than I thought,
here in the realm of things
that creep and thrive
in the structure of the soil
No need to covet repentance –
There are more than enough
ways for me to crumble,
leave my former ways of reckoning behind
I, too, can swell and grow,
in awe of what makes me,
in gratitude for every way I’m held
And for the daily
reassessing and revealing
of what interlocks us perfectly,
gives us our purpose
and makes us new.
©Wendy Mulhern
April 16, 2020
Typos should never happen in poems!!! People wonder whether it’s poetic license – they say to me, “I think maybe there’s a typo in your poem.” A typo can ruin the whole experience of reading a poem.
There was a typo in my poem yesterday. I caught it right after I published it, and fixed it on my blogs, but the email had already gone out. I realize as I write this that there are things I could do, like schedule for the poem to be published later. But I’m already at the edge with the technology, typing my poems out with two fingers on my phone…. not confident that I would catch it in time anyway (this is what I sound like when I ramble, which I generally don’t let myself do in poems.)
(Well, as long as I am rambling: I got put off Emily Dickinson by a typo in a pale purple mimeograph handout in eighth grade – “how dreary to be comebody (sic)” ) – But honestly, I don’t think she would’ve been my favorite, anyway…
Anyway, I’m very sorry about yesterday’s typo, especially because I really liked that poem. FYI, for those of you who get my poems via email, if you suspect a typo, you can click on the blue title, which will take you to my blog , where hopefully I will have fixed it.
Thank you all so much for reading my poems – it completes the loop for me.
We are all alike –
the mice, the birds, the deer,
you and me –
moving through the rounds
of our days, gathering up
what we can use –
A bug,, a bud, a shaft of sunlight,
a song that pierces time and space,
we tremble in the liquid of our being,
we glow in our own radiance of grace
We all are earnest,
we all are laughable
in that particular way
each of us moves
We will be humbled,
we’ll be exalted
shining despite ourselves
down all the tumble home.
©Wendy Mulhern
April 14, 2020
I envision you
welcomed into light,
welcomed home,
seen
in a lucidity and depth
you’d never known before
I feel you soften,
relax into the comfort and the confidence,
bask in recognition and appreciation,
and in the pleasure
of delighting all your company
I see you there
because each day
I feel a little closer to it –
as I approach this truth,
day by day, I feel
closer, too, to you.
©Wendy Mulhern
April 13, 2020
I find myself thinking of you,
spending my day wrapped in memory –
so many lenses to use
Each lens makes it different,
shades of the moods and the color
calling forth different scenes
All of these memories
still would be mine
no matter how things had come out
How I would view them
had things come out otherwise
isn’t a thing I could know
But the way that I knew you
shines clear, steps out strong,
leaves my clouded perceptions behind
How I knew you true then
is how I know you now, –
friend of my heart and my mind.
©Wendy Mulhern
April 11, 2020
“The meal cannot resist the yeast. “
And so it is, intelligence being primary –
not drivable from any lesser essence,
not divertible to any lesser goal
than bringing out the greatest good
So fear is overcome by grace,
having no power, finally,
to hold anyone enslaved,
the simple overriding truth
of goodness,
without any extra effort,
deftly melting fear away.
©Wendy Mulhern
April 9, 2020
And this is what it feels like
to step out of my back door
into my backyard
and walk
to my friend, the oak tree,
sheltering many birds
which I hear more than see
Turkeys near the fence,
green springing up everywhere,
afternoon wind, though strong,
not cold
This is what it feels like to live here,
which maybe I do now
and sometime I will for sure.
©Wendy Mulhern
April 9, 2020