We will know more of each other
as we meet in Spirit,
more of our hearts, more of our sparks,
more of our flights, our home, our satisfaction
We will know more of the land, too —
what it needs, what it gives,
who it shelters
All things grow richer as we’re rarified,
as we shift our cause/effect allegiance
to where our source lies.
©Wendy Mulhern
September 4, 2019
Sometimes it seems
there is so far to go,
so much to learn, so much to purge,
so many constructs to wean myself from
Sometimes I glide along
thinking how close I am
to my arrival, thinking
how far I’ve come,
how comprehensive
my transformation has been thus far
And then I see
how much I’m missing,
how vast the chasm
between my understanding and the truth
Good thing it isn’t up to me!
Good thing my life is held
in beautiful unfolding
where no partial understanding,
no faulty sense of needing to arrive
has any traction.
©Wendy Mulhern
September 3, 2019
Retile my past —
take all those broken squares,
those incomplete perceptions,
those ways I failed to see
the truth of being,
so I can understand
through present windows
that nothing in my life was ever missing
Is not this grace —
what wipes away without a trace
the meted consequence,
all our indebtedness?
— and in its place
reveals the fruit that waits
ready to satisfy
when it is seen.
©Wendy Mulhern
September 2, 2019
How does it feel
to be a crayon among nails?
Your purpose distinct
but immeasurably far
from the other ones sharing the pocket
Your substance, which never could manage
to do what a nail does,
is suited for doing a thing that they never could do —
they will sink into wood and remain there,
you’ll leave your mark on the surface and stay where you are
There will be times
when the hand reaches in
and picks out the nails one by one,
but at other times,
it will reach through their sharpness
leaving them, searching for you.
©Wendy Mulhern
September 1, 2019
I give my eyes to Truth.
Truth, train my eyes,
in this and every moment —
let me see straight
Catch me before my eyes
connect the dots in some distorted way,
before they draw conclusions
from some vapid, hapless picture —
help me behold unfolding acts of grace
and hidden harmony,
let them spring up before me,
showing me the universe of good
And if I haven’t seen them yet,
let me hold on, unfazed,
let me hold out for Truth’s appearing
in its own timeless rhythm
throughout my days.
©Wendy Mulhern
August 31, 2019
Afterwards, what I kept pondering
was the jewel in the storm,
the calm that could only be discovered
amid the raging, the peace
the storm brought out
by failing to ruffle it
even in the least
This is a thing to know about,
this is a thing to remember
even in lesser storms,
and when there’s no storm at all.
©Wendy Mulhern
August 29, 2019
I am an eager student —
I pore over the text
as meaning pours in
Something deep inside
soaks it up, stretches out,
like roots, like leaves, like wings
This is not something
for me to tuck away,
to tell myself I may use later
This is breath, this is sight,
this is the sense of things,
these are my steps along
the present path of what I am.
©Wendy Mulhern
August 27, 2019
You come back from the mountain
and what gets you is the day to day,
the small decisions and the interactions
that have the same ruts they had
when you were here before —
you think everything should be changed
but it isn’t
This is the challenge
greater than the summit —
to integrate the things you saw
into the fabric of every day,
to walk the same paths
but go up higher,
to taste the mountain air
right where you are.
©Wendy Mulhern
August 26, 2019
In the evening the wind stills,
and the work, though it continues till dusk,
is quieter — no thrum of generator,
no flap of windblown plastic,
just the intermittent buzz
of the skill saw, and the thunk
of extra rafter tail hitting the dirt
Later, we, too, will be still,
still in the aftermath of work,
still hefting lumber in our dreams.
©Wendy Mulhern
August 25, 2019
This morning it felt like fall —
fog through the valley, lifting into powder blue,
night’s chill and sun’s warmth coexisting,
different smells in dampness and in dry places,
readiness in the air
A flock of goldfinches
were very happy with our sunflowers,
exclaiming and conversing
as they landed, swaying,
on the flower heads
I woke up knowing
the only thing real
is the goodness of everything.
I saw it everywhere,
seeming to rest on things
but actually
being what they are.
©Wendy Mulhern
August 23, 2019