Tide is rising
and the craggy pools
where craggy animals had hidden
all alone against the scrutiny of sky
begin to have connections —
water seeping in
as if from nowhere,
channels forming,
tenuous potential
for some long-forgotten
kind of joining . . .
And then suddenly
there is no separation at all —
waves rush over everything
and they are all united
in the common deep.
©Wendy Mulhern
March 5, 2014
You start to wander
down the corridors
the scene shifts
before you get to ponder
how your thought drifts
how you start to wonder
what can lift you
from the tilting under
till you stop.
Those arguments
can roll past your head like clouds
and contract and expand
but they won’t touch you
and they can’t move anyone you love
and whatever shadows
they may cast across you
will move past
and be gone
You have been here
longer than your doubt
and you’ll endure
longer than the drama
where it twists
and tears you for a moment
and comes out.
©Wendy Mulhern
March 4, 2014
We slip through
changes like beaded curtains,
changes like painted landscapes —
dry ice steam rises
catching the colors of the lights —
We walk through,
find ourselves outside . . .
What has changed?
Values are inverted —
golds for purples,
shade for light,
soft light blue for tones of sunrise —
(Just the normal transmutations
of any day)
What has changed?
Unpredicted sunlight sifts through
the hair of boys in the cafe,
unexpected ease expands
moment by moment,
the old constraints replaced
each day a little more
by the positive assertion
of I Am.
©Wendy Mulhern
March 3, 2014
I go through the house
turning off lights, turning
down the heat
putting the house to bed . . .
Outside, the rain
has settled in for the night,
Inside, others
head towards sleep . . .
Far away
my children tend their own orbits —
I have signed over
the ownership of their peace . . .
Here at home
the soft night light
radiates out
enfolding us all
in its embrace.
©Wendy Mulhern
March 2, 2014
So many teachings
tell you what you are
and you say yeah,
that’s nice,
but how will it help me
through all these weighty duties,
all the dread annoyances
of every day?
What does it take
to make them make a difference?
— One experience of filling up
with all the joy of it —
A joy so wide,
your former view
of who you are
can’t hold it,
can’t hold the great
suddenly unfurling
You,
grand enough to encompass
all that goodness,
bright enough to light up
the whole sky.
©Wendy Mulhern
March 1, 2014
I see your face
and I know what it’s like
to have no doubt,
to never have pierced the casing.
never had cold scorn seep in
upon your certainty
of being loved
You meet each day
with eagerness —
in the rough and tumble
of your big brothers,
your place is wholly
one of joy
I see your face
and start to glimpse:
This is the way we all
have always
wanted to be held
You give us this —
We, too, can have it:
There is no outside
of that which holds us
in sheer delight,
in cradled bliss.
©Wendy Mulhern
February 28, 2014
No guilt,
of being found
with the impress
of a wound, stamped
in the sad and haunting image
of a wound
that you always have detested,
that you scorned
as it, in turn, was spurned
by countless others
in your place
who wished
as deeply as do you
they could be free
No curse
upon the generations
no alarm
no stain upon your visage —
You are pure,
as pure as all the others
down the broad and brilliant
pathway of your line,
For when you lift your head
out of that dream,
you lift them all,
and when you’re lifted,
you all, together, shine.
©Wendy Mulhern
February 27, 2014
It was something about trees —
the commitment, the certainty of their limbs
and the wholehearted way
they offer themselves
to the wind
It was something about laughter . . .
Trees can laugh
in the full-throated voice of storms
and in the head-tossing
clearing of the sky
There is a dance
of everything that’s free —
They dance as one
because they can,
because they all agree
that this time
is worth their presence
and this joining
serves their essence,
and they can be
deeply grounded
and also fly.
They’re here for something —
This dance is why.
©Wendy Mulhern
February 26, 2014
Bear me in your substance,
Fill me with your ocean,
Let your steady undulation
hold me, be my motion
Let our song ring long and far
throughout your depths,
Carving arcs on which we ride
in active rest
Safe within the tide
that pulls the pliant seas,
Keep this, our place of peace,
Be our deep ease.
©Wendy Mulhern
February 24, 2014
I want what I want.
My desire is my own.
No one can make me not want
what I want,
No one can make me
want what I don’t.
A simple truth,
a spinning shape,
flashing peach-toned light
through my center
outwards
What does it mean?
Joy and power
I want what I want:
it is not moderated,
not bargained down
or capitulated,
with no apology,
no wrong, no shame,
clear as my conscience,
strong as my name.
©Wendy Mulhern
February 23, 2014