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.

A Most Important Thing

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At this time of life
depth seems a most important thing —
the balance weights that extend  
below the illusion we call the ground,
the ones that give us
dynamic presence
so we can’t be tumbled
from our own truth.

Though many forces
may push us flat against the ground,
we are not phased
for we rebound,
immediately realign
with what we are,
embody a circumference
that’s wider far
than what we had before believed.

We need this depth
to move with purpose
through the social daze,
We need this size 
to overcome the myth of death.

©Wendy Mulhern
September 7, 2013


Sun Turn

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We rounded the bend
into the precipitous edge of fall,
the sky’s dynamics
dealing real cold air behind the clouds,
the sun’s warmth 
playing for higher stakes
and sometimes losing.

It was worth it this morning
to dress at three fifteen
and walk, almost blind, through the dark house
to find and muffle a light
and walk down to the water
to see if the stars
(so many, so bright)
would cast a clear reflection —
many did.

©Wendy Mulhern
September 6, 2013


Sisters

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(for my mom, and her sister Marcia, and, I hope, for Edith)

You have connections
you may not notice —
A shared light in the corner of access memory,
How your eye may catch your cheekbone, looking out,
Your love of birds,
deeper than articulation —
something tugging at your inner wings . . .
So, though your worlds diverge,
When you come together,
you find that seated ease
where words are comfortable
but not required.

©Wendy Mulhern
September 5, 2013


Crickets

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Cricket song, like stars
in the soundscape of the night
illumines the crisp air
with points of aural light

Memories of moments
stretch across the years,
bright spots of joy
like cricket song
fill my eyes and ears

There is a place
for every sound,
for every voice.
So crickets,
alone and in their undulating chorus
invoke my inner song,
let my heart rejoice.

©Wendy Mulhern
September 4, 2013


Americans

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We are actually much deeper
than the stories about ourselves,
the tragic, unanchored drifting,
vertiginous sense of not knowing,
of having no basis for deep compassion
and decisive action.
We are not those shallow people
who accumulate stuff
and blame others
for the lack of joy in our lives.

This is who we are:
Grounded in truth. Formidable.
Able to demand fairness for all,
able to protect the sovereignty and dignity
of every living thing.
Able to say no to the growing, rolling
ball of lies that tries to drag us under,
Able to stand as strong
as any long-oppressed survivor,
able to see love win.

©Wendy Mulhern
September 3, 2013


Martha’s Vineyard, Labor Day

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It’s still hot and muggy,
windy and cloudy,
but now, baptized by salt spray,
I move through the air
as one who belongs here,
easing into the familiar lightness 
of bone, expansiveness of breath.

Crickets and small birds
sing songs of evening.
Masts of moored boats clank,
engines of boats and planes
stretch out loud against the quiet of the land,
the rain and thunderstorms
still pent, unspent,
but I’m no longer waiting,
now fully here.

©Wendy Mulhern
September 2, 2013


A Moment

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For an instant,
in my prayer,
I saw all the darkness of the world
as being short as a breath —
an exhale awaiting the inhale,
an infant’s need reaching out
to be gathered into loving mother arms,
And all the world’s travails,
throughout all time,
as just that moment of the asking,
calling forth the full embrace
that brings us all in and in
into the truth of everlasting Love.

©Wendy Mulhern
September 1, 2013


Guidance

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I am thankful your desire
is stronger than your will,
stronger than your resolutions,
stronger than anything that I,
in my foolish teaching,
may have installed.
Your desire is a persistent weight
that always, in the end, plumbs true.
It will lead you
to just what you need.
It will feed you
all that completes you,
all that delivers you
to the life-filling purpose
that is you, that is your home.

©Wendy Mulhern
August 31, 2013


Symphony Road, Boston

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Through the city windows throb
music and voices from a life
that is not mine,
though the tendrils of connection
from my past
still reach deep into my psyche,
and the allure
of living that life
with the skills I have now
tickles my dreams.

But my face in the mirror shows me
this life is as far removed from me
as those voices,
close across the narrow street,
stories and walls away.

©Wendy Mulhern
August 30, 2013


Doing Things Together

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We did not sail in the rain
though we came right to the edge of it
in the sweet game of willingness
to enter the space of shared experience,
to find the delight 
in each other’s pleasure,
to join in at something 
that all of us love.

Anyone’s strong intent
would have brought the others along
but we all decided
in the grey mist and wind on the shore
that we’d be better served
going home
to hang out together and bake things
in the cozy kitchen,
letting the wind outside
wrap us in a soft cocoon.

©Wendy Mulhern
August 29, 2013