Category Archives: Earth Whispering: Poems

It’s my discipline to write a poem a day, and I post a poem here almost every day. To find a given poem or poems on a given topic, use the search bar at the right. To receive my poems by email, please subscribe, at right.

I’d love to hear your comments on any poems. To comment, click on the little speech bubble just under this text, to the right.

Sounds of Nightfall

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At twilight, midst the evening calls
of robins, blackbirds, flickers, other singers,
I hear the turkeys flying up to roost –
the loud clap of their wings, the landing,
which sounds almost like a crash,
the rather muted commentary

I don’t see them, but I know their sound,
for other years they’ve roosted
in trees near us,
and I could watch them settle in,.

After they’re quiet, after it’s dark,
the geese start up –
many a point to settle
before they call it a night.

©Wendy Mulhern
May 8, 2020

The Way of Heaven

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In the way of heaven,
not one of us is judged
for our bumbling efforts
to make our way on earth

And no one is rewarded
for being the high status clown –
each one of us is laughable
in our lowdown or our haughty way

We all are loved –
loved even while laughed at,
loved beyond laughter,
loved to the point of awe, of tears.
It is our disapproval that gets laughed away –
no one is disapproved of here.

©Wendy Mulhern
May 7, 2020

A Grand Dawn

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I was jumping up and down
trying to tell everyone,
Look what I’ve learned!
Look at the truth that changes everything!
I was thinking the most important thing
in my whole life
was finding a way to let people know

And then I realized
the same discovery must dawn
in everyone. In each of them
it must be as precious, as profound,
as earth moving, as it is for me.
No one needs a second hand dawn –
Each one gets their own

And how rich it is to see
this treasure, latent or in full bloom,
hidden or celebrated,
in every person. On the street,
in the grocery store, at their work,
each one promised and given
the holy vision
that means so much,
that means everything.

©Wendy Mulhern
May 6, 2020

Seedlings

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Sprouts of possibility
push themselves up
like seedlings where we’ve planted them –
still so small they’re almost imperceptible
but growing sturdier and more apparent

Like with my seeds, I’m not sure if I know
how best to tend them. Like my seeds
I’ll trust they’ll grow
with a power all their own.
I’ll try to keep them warm,
try not to over water,
and let the sun and springtime
bring them home.

©Wendy Mulhern
May 5, 2020

Reframe

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Sometimes it seems
a small misstep
can punch me right through the floor –
not into free fall
so much as into hobbled stuckness

One misspeaking
can rip the whole fabric
of our mutual understanding,
leave us hugging at our rags –
efforts to mend it just make deeper tears

There is no hope
but to step back
to where I’m formed anew,
and from there, let my eyes reframe
a truer view.

©Wendy Mulhern
May 3, 2020

End Game

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I don’t know how this ends,
don’t know how we can go back
to being as we were,
don’t know, either,
if there’s enough of a way forward
to see us through the fire

And I don’t want us to pass through
without being transformed –
crucible purified, phoenix transfigured,
rising out of the ashes
with nothing of our former bondage,
chains gone, rags burnt away,
so the shining truth of us
stands clear.

©Wendy Mulhern
May 2, 2020

The Roads of Melancholy

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Remembering that the roads of melancholy
are optional, the prompts
nudging me in that direction
really offering no reason
I would want to go there
(hoping I won’t notice I have a choice)

Remembering that,
I take a step back –
no need to commit to any path
and especially one that leads
where I don’t want to go.

©Wendy Mulhern
May 1, 2020

Spring Stream

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We watch the earnest braiding of the water
just before the stream takes its meander
back and forth amid the clumps of grass
before it dips and swoops down the drop
singing as it curls

This stream and these blackbirds
sing duets together,
each honing their skill
in the other’s purity

With our bare feet we feel
we take it in, too –
cold rippling enlivening clarity.

©Wendy Mulhern
April 30, 2020

Possible

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In this world, what I consider possible
is more important than I may fathom –
it is the lie of impossibility
that has kept me from claiming,
in every place I’ve missed it,
my dominion

So let me broaden the tent of my belief
so there is room for happiness,
not just for me – rather, for everyone –
Let them be thrilled and awestruck
by the fact of their own being

Not under some as yet unmet conditions,
Not the false possible conveyed by some “if only”,
but the true possible of This is what we’re here for
and this is how we live, and this is what we are.

©Wendy Mulhern
April 29, 2020

Proper Nourishment

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Let me live in the place
where there’s no game of better,
no game of not better either –
no grades or ratings,
no reflexive search
for what is wrong,
to make occasion
for being right

Let me wean myself
from that addicting food
which never satisfies,
but keeps me craving for
another dose of wrong
to point my finger at,
to show my smarts against –
It doesn’t have to be that way

Nudged by the wild plant lady,
I took a bite from the new growth
of douglas fir –
It was, as she said, refreshing,
surprising citrus before expected resin,
still tender to the tooth

And as she said,
I felt that it could nourish me
for many miles of walking,
and I could think of it as a gift,
I could be mindful every time I thought
of biting off another shoot –
take what is freely offered,
leave plenty behind.

©Wendy Mulhern
April 28, 2020