Author Archives: Wendy

Shirking

Posted on by
Reply

Something like a phrase I don’t quite hear,
distorted by a phase shift, fog, or dream,
sidles up against my waiting thought –
could I be your  poem? but says no more

It’s gray, and has some drape or flounce of fabric,
holes that could be lace, or rags,
a shuffle and a flutter  –
if I’m still, maybe it will come closer

This could be the price of reading all day
yesterday, and even for some hours today
(though I did dredge up some discipline
to do some chores)

Sunset came anyway,
colors mirroring the fire,
even its shapes echoing the logs,
while fog crept up beneath it …
granting grace in giving me the sight
before it swiftly rolled off into night.

©Wendy Mulhern
November 23, 2022

Music

Posted on by
Reply

Every tone that waits to chime
in the hollow of its time,
the perfect silence, opening
to give it space, to let it ring

Every voice that waits to sing
into the perfect listening,
the heart that hears, and tucks the song
where it can echo, sweet and long

All sounds, received, so find their rest,
a still point of their own,
the consummation of their quest,
the hum in which they’re known.

©Wendy Mulhern
November 21, 2022

Belonging

Posted on by
Reply

Who wouldn’t give up being a drop
to be a river? It’s not as if your essence changes –
it’s just that the illusion of isolation
is swept away, in the thunder of the power

It’s not as if the forces you run with,
the gravity, evaporation,
are different, though in the multitude
of your collective run,
you may feel more of what they do

And nothing stops you
from leaping up anyway, being
a sparkling drop, dissipating into mist,
drifting far into the forest
to commune with trees

Just that you always feel
the pull home, and the desire to mingle,
and your belonging
in all the secret passageways,
above ground and under –
everywhere the river calls its own.

©Wendy Mulhern
November 20, 2022

Your place

Posted on by
Reply

Back up, back up, pull your hand
out of the puppet, pull your voice
out of the dream. Stand up
and shake out your mane. Stand straight
and assume your actual character.
You can walk free of the whole set.

You are not bound by any script.
Your  scenery is here – so much vaster
than the theater. You can walk out
into the wild wind. You can laugh
with the whistling trees. You can
let your heart be filled
with the power of your truth.
More than magical, it holds you steady
in the awe-filled unfolding essence,
harmony, and your place in it,
life, and your reason for it,
Love, and its touch in all that you are.
You, now being known.

©Wendy Mulhern
November 19, 2022

Wellness

Posted on by
Reply

Seven o’clock, and the wellness of the morning
sits more steady than the fog
and the frost that cases spider silk
and grass stalk

It settles in the warmth from last night’s fire,
radiated from the stone,
shared with floor and walls

Seven fifteen, and the wellness of the morning
crackles in the new fire,
rests softly in the work
left over from last night

Be well – your life thrives
before any of these things –
it brings the wellness through,
its source infinite,
its expression unconfined.

©Wendy Mulhern
November 17, 2022

Smile time

Posted on by
Reply

In the smile time of the afternoon,
strands of spider silk gleam with sunshine,
they hang from fences, they catch the wind
and float off – I don’t know
if they have a purpose now,
except to be delightful

Deer stayed for about an hour
on the shadowed north side of the house
after the frost was gone,
on ground that never warmed –
they browsed, then sat, and moved on later –
I don’t know why they chose that spot

In the smile time of the afternoon,
the air relaxed, and let itself get warm
even out beyond the porch’s shelter,
and no one could resist
the quiet calm
the infinite provided
for that fleeting time.

©Wendy Mulhern
November 16, 2022

Invitation

Posted on by
Reply

When I come to the beach
and I take off my shoes
and the wind and the water
ask me to dance,
I can never refuse,
for the sound and the smell and the feel
of that last salt-tinged rush across the sand,
and the sheen, and the pattern of ripples,
push the ocean message up through my feet  –
all that vast chorus of power –
and I can’t help but fly.

©Wendy Mulhern
November 14, 2022

When you know

Posted on by
Reply

When you know what’s true,
the cabinet of stresses
opens its doors
and lets everything fall out –
all the pressures, all the worries,
chagrin, regret, despair  –

They dissipate, and the place they were
begins to fill in
with the obvious order
of things that are living  –
branches reaching up,
roots extending down,
everything expressly purposed  –
nothing random, nothing useless

The clatter of clutter
gives way to the hum of living,
and its clear alignment
shows itself to be
all that was ever here.
When you know what’s true,
you see and feel it.

©Wendy Mulhern
November 13, 2022

“The just shall live by faith “

Posted on by
1

This morning quest
has me once again
seeking the well of hope,
learning what I hope for

Sipping the substance,
tasting the flavor –
my hope for truth, my desire
for life and love

I ponder: this indeed
must be the substance of my being,
this spark, this longing,
must hold the definition
of who I am

Must remind me
what I live by,
what I live for,
what will guide me
humble and exultant,
through the many turnings of my day.

©Wendy Mulhern
November 12, 2022

Realms

Posted on by
Reply

In the clear water
the clear fish come into view,
delicate skeletons seen by their flickering,
swift shimmer along the edge of fin –
they drift, they ghost – I can almost
see one through another

Whole networks are made of these –
food chains, symbioses  –
conducting their business mostly unseen –
vast webs of them stretch through oceans
which they now define
here in my mind
where they swim silent
widening my realms.

©Wendy Mulhern
November 11, 2022