Maybe I’ve used up all my words,
except the ones that will describe
the thoughts that haven’t fully proved themselves
The thoughts are eager. They want to save the world.
They are sure they can, sure their lens,
with dedicated focus, can burn through every lie
The words are watching. They’ll choose
and arrange themselves, once they’ve seen
something certain. Meanwhile they think
there’s nothing new and true enough
for them to say.
©Wendy Mulhern
April 22, 2023
Not teapots and sofas,
but estimates of cause and effect,
anticipation of results,
calculations
of triumph and regret
I’m asked to give up
thinking my feeling
reflects what someone else
has said or done,
give up believing
that my well-being
is something to be given or withheld
I’m asked to grasp the solidness of Spirit,
the all inclusive scope of comprehensive Mind,
how my well-being rests
on everpresent Soul alone,
how this All-seeing graciously
calls me its own.
©Wendy Mulhern
April 19, 2023
The color is yellow
with red at the center,
the sound is clear water
in echoing caves,
the feeling is peace, the feeling is strength,
the taste
is thirst quench
and promise
This is a truth I grasped in a moment,
something discovered within,
challenge and touchstone
to use for my practice,
place to return to begin.
©Wendy Mulhern
April 18, 2023
Signs of a day well spent
rest on my eyes and cheekbones –
more than the gift of warming sun
and cooling wind, and work outside,
this sense of symphony
(haunting sweetness of the oboe,
deft arpeggiation branching through the strings)
surrounds us in a hallowed circle
All is well, and all is held
safe in the hand of harmony –
we live our lives as prayer and art
and work and joy and play.
©Wendy Mulhern
April 16, 2023
I find myself connected
as paths fan out dendritic
like breath within, like hyphae,
like the T in Boston
I find myself suffused with such affection
as this life moves through me,
filling and sustaining me,
the lines of generations
deepening connection,
the web of shared perception
annulling time.
©Wendy Mulhern
April 14, 2023
I come upon this here,
my life, it would seem,
a bend of road, all these things
placed for some purported purpose,
and rain that’s fallen here –
how it has puddled
A road with mud and gravel,
a road with evening sky,
the path I travel,
a way to sometimes fly.
©Wendy Mulhern
April 13, 2023
We, too, stand and let the light glow through us,
we, too, are formed in this communion,
we, too, reach out and grow,
nourished by what shines on us,
what shines us
And that compelling brilliance
you may see for just a moment
is really what we are, all of the time.
We stay attuned to this,
for this is all we need,
all we need and all we really know.
©Wendy Mulhern
April 12, 2023
In spring there is no thought
of being trapped in winter’s guarding case –
attention, rather, focuses
on rising sap, where energy can stretch,
on what was promised
in the fall, and put to sleep,
and now awakens,
discovering its form, its destiny,
its place in time, the season of its place,
and what was sheathed unfurls
in unencumbered grace.
©Wendy Mulhern
April 10, 2023
These are fluid things,
silver, eager, bright –
they move quickly into any shape suggested.
When you observe their shape,
they take that image in,
use it to reinforce the picture,
make it seem more true
When you assign a cause,
a reason, a history,
they weave that in, too,
till you might think they had existence
independent of your thought,
might find them to comprise a solid obstacle
They mean no harm –
they live to serve –
they don’t intend to trap you –
give them the guidance
to shape your truest hopes –
they’ll shine them forth
in beauty and delight.
©Wendy Mulhern
April 8, 2023
Various choruses
are not surprised
at my thought coming round to you –
the time of year, they say,
the necessary reckoning …
I don’t know. Could be …
I could choose to be
an old woman, sitting among my shards,
flickers of memories, glints of past light,
Or I could join you here in heart warmth –
what you have always given me,
what you give me still,
helping my ground to new, abundant, life.
©Wendy Mulhern
April 7, 2023