Author Archives: Wendy

Resistance

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We will slide
with the weight of water
out from the grasp
of all that sought to hold us.
We will collect in pools,
we will run in rivulets,
very quietly at first.

We will hide
in soft hollows
and be taken up by roots.
We will engage in cycles
that can’t be regimented.
We will use the tools
that can’t be taken from us —
gravity and surface tension,
super qualities inherent in our molecules.

Without our presence, all the structures —
every edifice of fear and guilt,
all the avenues of shame and blame,
all the lies that say we need their toxic brew —
will tend towards dust, becoming very dry,
will grow more brittle, and will start to fail.
It won’t be long before they blow away
and cease to plague our world.

We will slide softly
but with growing power.
We will build with what’s alive.
We’ll own our moments
and claim our hours,
and in our reclaimed truth,
we’ll thrive.

©Wendy Mulhern
July 4, 2013


A Dream

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The power started calling.
Its lines were well-developed —
vast networks underground —
and it started calling her.
Its call was stronger, more persistent,
than the voices of caution,
the voices of fear,
that said
this is not human,
you would betray humanity
to take it up.

And she knows she has to do it
so she goes —
follows its direction down suburban streets,
finds the corner place and reaches down
to heft the golden bricks.
The power comes up out of the earth
in swirls of white and gold.
A deep hole forms, and the swirls keep rising.
A woman in a windbreaker
stands beside her, resolute,
her jacket flapping in the rising of the power.
She says, But I need to stand in defense of love!
Don’t I need to stand in defense of love?
The voice says, Love doesn’t need to be defended.
She says, But I need to stand in defense of the earth!
Don’t I need to stand in defense of the earth?
The voice says,
The earth doesn’t need to be defended.

©Wendy Mulhern
July 3, 2013


Succession

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(for Edward)

In the way that ecosystems climax,
You and I are most-enduring trees,
surviving fires, holding the soil,
spreading our crowns
to shelter and extend
life’s dear elixir

And you have been
my strong companion,
filling in where I have faltered,
anchor of my habitat
throughout the years.

In the way that Life designs us —
brought forth where our purpose can be met,
So, now, I see it finds you
in the time where you’re uniquely set
to bless

It is my privilege
to witness you, and your unfolding,
and to hold with you
and keep on holding,
while all our former fetters fall away
and we stand splendid
in the dawning truth of day.

Happy birthday, love —

©Wendy Mulhern
July 2, 2013

A new way of looking at patience

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Patience is knowing
that everything moves
in the rhythm of Life,
and every need is being met —
all the microscopic needs
in the give and take
that feeds each tiny mouth,
and the orchestrated needs
of larger systems —
great living networks
of realized mutual trust,
resulting in the intricately timed provision
of each response along the moving wave

And as this is the case,
Life’s essence operating
in every place,
it surely will continue
in the arc whereon you gaze,
anticipating some desired conclusion.
Grace is not capricious,
not the gain of luck or chance —
it is the rhythm,
fractally repeated,
present where you need it —
it is the constant motion
of Life’s defining dance.

©Wendy Mulhern
July 1, 2013


The rhythm of summer

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Everything is moving in the rhythm
of summer —
sound of wind chimes,
scent of privet,
transfixing flit of
not-quite-random insects,
play of light on spider webs,
crows in conversation —

There is something to learn from this,
something to take with me
from the unhurried connection of events,
the space between
that’s long enough for slack,
supple so it ripples smoothly.

Here where it’s too hot
for spiking urgency
or any worry,
things still progress
prodigiously,
with ample room
to take their perfect time.

©Wendy Mulhern
June 30, 2013


Reflections while driving home from recovering my car after it was towed from where my children parked it

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I’m grateful that you’re here,
grateful that we could bail you out
and bring you home,
and have you in our lives,
Grateful that this, too,
is life-building,
and you will be stronger
because of it

Grateful to have learned
(though sorry that I didn’t learn it sooner)
that we only have one job
concerning you,
which is to see you —
to behold, in awe, your essence,
far more intricate and comprehensive
than we could grasp in a moment
or in years,
though we might glimpse it
in either years or moments . . .

No need to compel or criticize —
We only need (and need to only)
see and celebrate
what you bring,
what you give,
what you are.

©Wendy Mulhern
June 29, 2013


Ecology

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Nothing is condemned,
Nothing thrown away —
There are so many branches
along life’s paths —
So many cycles
at every speed and scale
and everything is moving,
aligned in some great plan,
rolling out the endless course of life

No one is condemned,
No one cast aside,
for every life uniquely serves its purpose
and all shall be embraced,
for everyone belongs
and all of us
are needed where we are.

©Wendy Mulhern
June 28, 2013


My Final Offer

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There is no part of my desire
that I’m willing to give up.
I insist on all the goodness
that I crave:

The part about the living land
and our deep kinship with it;
The part about our well-honed gifts
and all the richness shared in their fruition;
The part about our home
and all the others who live with us;
The part about the healing of the earth;

All these must be included
in the goodness we acquire,
No part may be excluded from the vision.
I won’t agree to any less
and so it must be given.

©Wendy Mulhern
June 27, 2013


Entering

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Bring nothing with you,
for everything you need
is in your power to see what’s here

And there’s a lightness in knowing
every moment has, within it,
deep wells of richness,
plenty for your present thriving

And there’s no lack
of the substance in yourself
that calls forth that dark glow —
the subterranean shining
that quenches every thirst.

©Wendy Mulhern
June 26, 2013


Riding the beast

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The lengths of highway
flex their strength
like muscular snakes.
We who have thought 
they lived to serve us
start to feel our big mistake,
Start to sense how trapped we’ve been
in the grid of roads,
in the grid of time,
in the grip of (up till now)
unquestioned rules
that say we have to ride the snakes
and serve the hours 
and not complain
when (for our safety)
more and more of liberty
is locked away.

If we are to escape,
we must slide, softly,
off the back of what we have been riding,
Find ourselves together off the grid,
Build the places in between
until they make new paths
for all our energies.
Let the beast grow old and still
through lack of use,
Give our every effort to our truth.

©Wendy Mulhern
June 25, 2013