Tag Archives: life

Living On

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living on

(Cynthia’s wisdom)

You will live on.
This is your gift —
Your aliveness
with which you feel
every incredible tender thing —
the supple softness of rose petals,
the rush of breath against your heart,
stirrings of life forces
across your skin

You are alive
and you can bring them with you,
the ones you loved —
You haven’t lost them
because they live in you.
You can’t leave them
any more than you could leave
your bones, your blood

You have to take them with you
(which is what you wanted anyway)
This is your gift
to you and your loved ones —
You take them with you
as you live on.

©Wendy Mulhern
June 29, 2014

Impress

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impress

Who can actually
look back or forward?
The rolling drum of life
stamps its impress
on our moments,
thick and deep,
And we are caught up in it,
and everything that was our past
is far from our attention
And what the coming press might hold,
we can’t foresee
And it’s OK to be
here in the quick of it,
the colors glistening
and dripping from our hands.

©Wendy Mulhern
June 24, 2014

Weave

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weave

Flying down the warp of life
past the constant shuttle
of many colored wefts,
there is no one of them
you can take with you —
Nothing that you swiftly cross
can satisfy you
in your speeding course

Take satisfaction
in the silken strength
wherewith you are designed
and in the splendid order
of the loom
and in the dance that opens ways
to make room
for endless looping brightness

And feel yourself enfolded in the colors,
each one reliant on your clear integrity
that doesn’t waver in its steady place
within the cosmic frame
that holds your life.

©Wendy Mulhern
June 13, 2014

Processes

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processes

Well, all this postulation,
all these square-edged pages,
cluttered thought,
have held me, for a time,
in a constricting maze

And I have found my breathing shallow
in the halted place
of waiting
while trying to push time,
regretting,
not able to make amends,
feeling the black ink of belittling stories
run towards my eyes

But all these things must fade
against the call of life,
grow weak against the moist soil,
disintegrate,
be swept away
by the bright deep breathing
of the water cycle,
of earth and sky,
and the clear imprint
of the living day.

©Wendy Mulhern
April 9, 2014

Interlude with Cherry Blossoms

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cherry blossoms1

Fallen blossoms coat the grass, the streets,
Petals float into my open window,
I am guided here
by something larger
than my own design,
So I will wait

Pale pink mixes with random raindrops,
Wind stirs up the mix and sets it down,
Pale green emerges on the trees
where pink has fallen,
In a little while, I guess,
I’ll head for home

This is a street with cars, with lawns, with houses,
Not many people though, this time of day,
The petals make their way
in silent offering,
life-gift to earth,
a blessing that will stay.

©Wendy Mulhern
April 3, 2014

At the core

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Oh, we are all the same,
heart of lettuce, core of onion, carrot top —
We have our generative essence,
we will grow
from this central point,
put out our leaves
and reach into the soil
for what we need

But we’re not made to thrive alone —
Our growth, beyond our spark,
requires some need our presence meets,
some gift which, when we give it,
cantilevers strength for us and them

This web we share —
How it breathes,
the giving and receiving
in ecstatic rise and fall,
how intricate its network,
how tenderly it holds us all!

©Wendy Mulhern
January 29, 2014

Mastery

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We will stop seeing ourselves
as creatures of prohibition,
the ones who see themselves confined
within the narrow lines
of what’s allowed

And we will not play out
the acts of prohibition —
the tearing down, denying
and forbidding

We will understand
that the great dominion
has never been destruction,
that intelligence has a greater work

And that the building up of anything,
a life, a town, a cause,
must use the tools of life,
allowing everything
to tumble forth and thrive,
and in its living find its integration,
teem, and be itself, and be alive.

©Wendy Mulhern
January 26, 2014

Breath

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In the end
the things we’re asked to know
are the same things stones know
as they absorb their daily thermal load
and then release it slowly to the night,
a breathing that befits their time —
long and steady and calm

And what we’re asked to know
is what trees know
as they embrace the standing wave of energy,
toroidal cycling
of air and light and water,
breath of the forest, sweet and pure

We’re asked to know
the things our breathing teaches
in the constant ebb and flow
and in the depth it reaches
and the way we’re woven
into one complete design,
breath of our days,
earthbound, divine.

©Wendy Mulhern
January 24, 2014

Tuning

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In this vision,
the antelopes are tuned
into existence,
huge waves of them
rolling in and out of
atmospheric haze,
keenly aware of their
sharp pounding against the ground
in the rolling rhythm of multitude
and the strong smell of each other
and the heat and dust
and the surging imperative importance
of life, this now
in which they run.

©Wendy Mulhern
January 14, 2014

Biodiversity

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Some seeds won’t sprout
in these conditions —
they’ll wait dormant
till things change,
and then, as saviors,
as tiny carriers of daring hope
of life’s return,
they’ll spring up, set their leaves,
and thrive

There may be parts of you
that haven’t sprouted,
and you may have wondered why —
perhaps you’ve doubted
life’s provision, or life’s wisdom,

But things may change
and suddenly you’ll find
a capability you never nurtured,
rising strong, growing apace
with all the needs of now,
blessing you, blessing everyone.

There’s room for all of your potential,
and it’s needed.
In its time
each gift will shine.

©Wendy Mulhern
December 10, 2013