Moments when the evening brings
a recognition across substances,
surprise of patterns
in things of different planes,
crosswise in time,
make me ponder
the common elements we all are made of –
nothing foreign here or anywhere we walk
companioned by the ripples through our day.
©Wendy Mulhern
September 9, 2022
September rides two horses,
one foot on the back of each,
reins held easy in one hand –
the horse of summer and the horse of fall –
they gallop down the days
in the same direction,
in perfect step,
manes and tails and breath mingling,
providing an exhilarating ride.
©Wendy Mulhern
September 8, 2022
This could be what I need –
something to run with,
something that kicks up
like quickening storm winds,
something within me to give me the vim
I will need for the long trek ahead
Maybe it’s been here
but I haven’t known it,
or I hadn’t known it till now –
let me be faithful in living it eagerly,
moving with vigorous stride,
Spirit song surging inside.
©Wendy Mulhern
September 7, 2022
Lest we exchange the worries of summer
for the worries of fall – worries of fire
for worries of cold and wet –
let us remember
each day has space for stillness,
each hurtling revolution
has time for many lifespans,
and dreams float timeless
in the sea of thought, which itself,
though it may shift with tides
is ever vast enough
to see us home.
©Wendy Mulhern
September 5, 2022
We each will be grateful
for what has saved us,
for what has proved to be our swing
bearing us steadily up
after our fall,
when we shattered through the bottom
of our fears, and lay there, desolate
Each of us found it there,
the broad, abiding presence,
the sense of not alone,
the sweet nourishment
of being cradled –
when we shouldn’t have, couldn’t have lived,
there we were,
and it means everything to us
And if you haven’t fallen,
have no fear –
in time you will be given
everything you need
You may think you don’t want it –
that’s OK – your knowing will still come for you –
you’ll find it,
in your perfect time and perfect way.
©Wendy Mulhern
September 4, 2022
If I die, I will die of mortality –
there is no other cause of death.
Other things people might call it
are so many irrelevancies –
whether I die of grief or mistrust or fear,
or of the planet’s burgeoning despair,
or of somebody’s anger, or someone else’s greed,
or of toxicity of any sort, bleeding
through the boundaries of being
All these so-called causes are just distractions,
for without mortality, I will not die.
Well then, let me consider
exactly what I am. Let me consider it
every hour. What are the colors and the flavors
of immortal moments?
What is my practice of living them?
It’s not about not wanting to die,
but of yearning to finally really live.
©Wendy Mulhern
September 3, 2022
Could be a thing you think of
as a little tiny speck, a mote
carried by the wind
that chanced to land –
a thing so insignificant
it isn’t even worthy of a mention
Could be the thing you think is small
was never elsewhere, never
drifted with the wind, never alighted here,
but is a place where the concealing paint has chipped –
could be that fleck of gold
reveals the whole of what you are,
and when you’ve seen it once,
you’ll see it more and more
and will discover,
despite whatever you had thought,
it is more weighty
than anything you’d ever known before.
©Wendy Mulhern
September 2, 2022
Before we’re even ready
to fully own our nature,
stride the acceleration
of swift unfolding purpose
We still can feel our nature
enlighten daily moments,
fill them with sweetness,
let us knit together easy
with those we have been given to collaborate,
co-exult, co-inspire, communicate,
leave us sound and light bathing
in the clear reverberation
of all that we have seen, and been, today.
©Wendy Mulhern
September 1, 2022
It’s morning, and I’m headed home,
across the sound, across the sky,
my ranging thoughts preceding me –
how wide they fly
Could be we’re always going home,
drifting steadily on friendly winds,
finding ways to stretch in our expression
of what we are, and what can draw us on
Could be that what we grasp in glimpses,
the singular bright moments of the day,
will own us more and more, till we inhabit
a realm of light, a swift expanding way.
©Wendy Mulhern
August 30, 2022
There is an art to this, a balance,
like stepping onto a thing that flies –
in your exhilaration, to still keep steady,
to get yourself up on a plane
and whoop across the waves
There is an art to this, a balance,
but the principle is steady,
so if you fall, you can regroup –
all the forces will still be there
to catch you up again
when you are ready
And grace, it seems,
is like the wind, and also
like your wings that catch it –
you ride the moment
right through the gusts of it,
whoop in mounting joy
across the day.
©Wendy Mulhern
August 29, 2022