I see my sentience
is entirely thought —
pervasive loops which constitute
my sense of being here,
of who I am

I see how easily the perturbations
(suggestions of alarm, of need to see
what I have wanted as an outcome
come to pass,
the wavering braids of hope and fear
and then the closing sentence)
can form and sway what I have called my life

But this is not my all:
These things which claim
to be the outer world,
and chance, and fate,
and what might come of me today,
are currents in the same domain of thought

In which I would be rudderless
if not for this release:
to give it up,
to still my oar,
to calm my care
and ride the stream in gratitude
everywhere.

©Wendy Mulhern
March 18, 2015