(from our conversation)

We come to discover
(again and again, it seems)
that there is nothing we can gain
by iron will, by lining up
the vectors and the dominoes of force,
by straining, with the tension of our eyebrows
(ache in our eye sockets from sharpness of the focus)
for what we feel is right

We learn that in our present love,
so constantly re-flooded
by new unfolding wonder,
revealings of the bud, the bloom, the leaf,
the smile, the creativity, the insight —
In this response, the love that feeds us
even as we give it,
is all the power to open out the world.

©Wendy Mulhern
April 19, 2015