Author Archives: Wendy

Flood Waters

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I don’t know why I sat there
and fed myself footage
of tsunamis, and police brutality,
and travesties of justice,
don’t know why I kept watching
when up till then my day had been
so positive

I don’t know why I then got impatient
and wrote a note that brought a bad reaction,
don’t know why I seem to want
to escalate it

I will refrain. I will
take myself to bed. I will
wait until morning. Maybe
by then the flood waters
will have subsided
and I’ll see a clear path.

©Wendy Mulhern
April 9, 2015

The Valley of Shadows

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shadows

In the shaft of rescuing light, I see
I was not wrong,
need bear no shame,
for letting myself fall into shadow

I’m not expected to prevent
the cold dark spires
from passing over me,
the deepened gloom
from seeping in

It’s been foretold that this would happen
not once but regularly,
for which I am given instruction:
Walk through.

Walk through without fear:
Neither the shadow
nor the saving light
are your creation

But my feet are mine
and the light within
(though it seem tiny in its distance)
will ever seek its own
and pull me through.

©Wendy Mulhern
April 8, 2015

Confessions

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My emotion spreads over the plate
like liquid too thin to hold itself together,
It drips off the edges and streams down
sticky as heated honey

See, I am not dead,
nor am I middle-aged, middle-class stodgy.
I haven’t honeycombed my feelings off
and sealed them tightly where you’ll never see them,
so I can act like I can’t even feel them,
act so dull that I convince myself

See, I ooze, I drip —
but what good does it do me?
How will I clean this all up
and get on with my day?

©Wendy Mulhern
April 7, 2015

Conversation Woes

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Bracketts spring

 

The game that we call conversation
may move as fast as any kind of ball —
the words may volley back and forth as swiftly
but then the message hangs before it falls

Revealing layers that we may have missed
that make us double back and reconsider
that what we said may not be what we meant
and what we meant may not have been delivered

And where we stand can slide away
and leave us lodged, hapless and ungainly,
between assumption and intention
with something that we’ve said now seen
(too late) as better not to mention

In the end, compassion’s patient comb
must disentangle all the snarls of words
until in understanding we come home,
release the sting of unintended hurt.

©Wendy Mulhern
April 6, 2015

Tactile Dreaming

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tactile dreaming

I woke up on my side.
I was surprised, for in the dream
my arms were stretched out,
air cushion tactile
against my hands and upper arms,
its shifting pressure confirmation
that I was flying,
exhilaration coursing through my core and limbs
while bluff and cove passed swiftly underneath,
such a glad respite
from the sharp stoned path

I woke up languid,
lay there happy, in no hurry,
letting my dream body
have the time
to settle back in.

©Wendy Mulhern
April 5, 2015

Spring Hay

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spring hay

The green blades don’t try
to inhabit last year’s stalks,
pressed by wind and rain
into the earth
(though they grew high
and pioneered so much)

The green blades
ride the surge of life upward,
energy released from where it waited underground,
springing up and up to harvest sunlight

There’s no need
to cart the old stalks away —
they will decay
while new hay rises vibrant,
lush, thick, tall,
taking the field.

©Wendy Mulhern
April 3, 2015

Subtle Loveliness — Three Sketches

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moon2

1.
I see the moon through mist,
I see the subtle loveliness of clouds
that move like lace across her face,
and how she laughs as they change her shape
just for a moment

2.
I think about the spread of colors, where they appear —
Red rolling into green through luxurious russets,
Golds darkening to ambers in the rich wood,
Plum, wine, umber, concentrate to near black:
It comes clear to me why pink is not a part of red
though sky and ocean share the name of blue

loveliness2a

3.
I think of what I see as I drift towards dream,
how colors rise up out of darkness
and when, to my closed eyes,
the light of thought appears,
defining the forms as they emerge from shifting splotches
carrying me off into the vision that reprises
all the things I didn’t know I saw.

©Wendy Mulhern
April 2, 2015

Dawn Chorus

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twin ponds through grass

Maybe there’s no need
to talk much
about the new awakening
Maybe it’s plenty good
to just listen
to the yawning and stretching
and the stunned silences
and the quiet gasps
and involuntary cries
Maybe we don’t need
to tell each other to awake,
for perhaps we all
are the dawn chorus.

©Wendy Mulhern
April 1, 2015

photo by Edward Mulhern

“Sink like a stone, Float like a feather”

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sink like stone

When you’re caught in the web
and nothing makes sense
and all your moves to free yourself
just render you more tangled
You can always go within,
sink like a stone
in the gravity
of all you care about —
fall densely and deeply
into the knowing
of your essence,
the rock from whence you were hewn

When the weight of the world
holds you pinned and immobile,
inertia bearing down upon
your every motivation,
You can always reach out
and float like a feather
in the infinite affection
that holds you so tender,
your every breath
responded to
in the sweet song of being,
crooned now so softly
for you.

©Wendy Mulhern
March 30, 2015

Clarion

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evening mist

Only so much time
can be spent in shock
though waves and afterwaves
of revelation
keep sending their tremors
roiling and insistent
throughout the startled landscape
of my consciousness

Only so much time
can be given
to parsing out the network
of the old lies —
how they snared us
is far less relevant
that what we need to do
and how we can,
and how we follow the imperative
to rise.

©Wendy Mulhern
March 29, 2015