At some point I noticed
I was thinking of the day
in terms of enduring –
waiting out the heat till evening,
so I took a cold shower
and sat on the porch in the shade
listening to cicadas and quiet birds
I’ve been training myself to step away
from the clenched pause from enjoyment
I called enduring,
to recast that quality
as a more alert patience,
a nimbler approach to living the moments
I will traverse anyway
and might as well enjoy.
©Wendy Mulhern
June 26 2021
Everyone is looking for places to stay cool,
and I’m feeling the wish
to write a long story,
one of missed connections
and broken threads –
lost threads seeking each other over years,
sad and tragic mismatches
that people settled for
after their dreams were lost
But all the threads of the story
are subsumed,
changed as tide pools change
when tide comes in –
things that were disconnected
become one,
things that were lost
unite on holy ground.
©Wendy Mulhern
June 25, 2021
If we understood our power,
every one of us,
we’d know that all of us are rich
and any one of us
can bring in the divinity of peace
the game-arresting concord of divinity
If we understood our power,
we’d know that none of us
can be impoverished,
for nothing can be taken
from our wholeness,
and nothing can deprive us
of our sovereignty
If we understood our power,
life would flow abundantly
at our hands, lush gardens
would spring forth
and be inhabited,
and every living thing we thought was lost
will find its way back
to flourish and bask in our grace.
©Wendy Mulhern
June 24, 2021
I tried to write a poem
before my exertion –
put down some rhythmic platitudes –
not untrue, except in how they felt
But now I’m here
under the house
learning the lessons of humility
amid the insulation dust,
wielding my knife and my learning curve –
not much to say about it
Last night we watched virga at sunset,
talked until it turned from dark pink
to dark gray,
watched the almost full moon get brighter,
said good night
far later than we planned to.
©Wendy Mulhern
June 23, 2021
Love illumines you.
Understand this:
follow the pulse of your being
all the way down
to what wants to be –
what wants to be seen,
what wants to be known,
what hungers to find its expression
Love illumines you
way down to the core –
love is what courses
underneath everything,
spurring your very existence
Love illumines you
from the inside,
the only light you can see by,
the light by which you are seen –
look how it shines you up
right through whatever else
you may have thought had to be
Look how it shows you are
everything that you are,
right through what others might see,
right to the place you are free.
©Wendy Mulhern
June 21, 2021
On this longest day
I’m guarding your dinner
from the mice
while mosquitoes sing me love songs
on the porch
The last streak of sun
has left the ground
and the neighbor’s dogs
have started their night time commentary
What I am to learn today
I may not yet know
but it’s the longest day
so there is time.
©Wendy Mulhern
June 20, 2021
What a relief it is to realize
I don’t have to direct the pieces,
I don’t need
to make things come together
or even figure out what needs fixing
My shadow was smiling as it walked
in the evening sun, down to the cabin –
I could tell by the bounce in its gait –
it, too, must be relieved
not to have to determine
where it’s going – to simply glide
through the dapples and into shade.
©Wendy Mulhern
June 19, 2021
Walk into the quiet,
feel your footsteps echo
open up the doors
and let the wind blow through
Try this: the screen doors, almost closed,
will whistle, even howl –
close them all the way, and you will hear
the birdsong again, and distant traffic,
and ravens holding court across the field
Daisies are rampant in the fields,
and bracken fern beyond them –
everything has shot up fast, yearning
towards seed
And as for us, we’re just working
on learning to be quiet,
how to be quiet, and still progress,
how to be quiet and still
while wind and sun progress through summer,
how to inhabit our house with mastery,
how to inhabit this house enough
to find it finished.
©Wendy Mulhern
June 18, 2021
Every lovely thing must learn its source.
Reflections may become choppy,
light deflected and dispersed,
connections may be missing,
purpose lost,
and evidence of essence may seem dim
No loveliness is lovely on its own,
no truth is isolated,
the yearning for more light leads each one home
to where the precious essence is renewed
No mirror can sustain itself as sun,
nor can it be deprived of its desire,
the source awaits for everyone to turn
to find the shine that lights their inner fire.
©Wendy Mulhern
June 16, 2021
The house catches the beauty of the evening sun
only for a moment – a cloud at the hilltop
snatches it up, uses it for a lining
Tears can gather on anything,
easy as raindrops, easy as a squall
appearing at the hilltops, then rushing through
There is beauty in the streaked view
after many tears, the way the landscape
multiplies emotions, the way the thistle
embodies such elegance,
such confident self-knowing,
how its elongating leaves point up
with a symmetry recalling snowflakes
I can go through a storm, I can do it
as often as I need to. When I come out,
the land will be here,
offering its tender lessons.
©Wendy Mulhern
June 15, 2021