It’s no surprise to me actually
that my life look like this
from the outside,
such that a card could call it.
It has been my inside secret,
it has been my cross,
it has been the nature of my search
these past years,
my solitary travel
And why should I not expect
it to continue
till I reach its end,
till I learn what meets it,
what heals its wounds?
©Wendy Mulhern
January 16, 2022
When I woke from my nap,
words kept darting around
like rapid eye movement,
stitching images together –
sense from nonsense, or vice versa
I had closed my eyes for just five minutes
but suddenly it was ten thirty
and I had no reason
to be up anymore
except to catch some fleeting words
and put them on a page.
©Wendy Mulhern
January 15, 2022
We walk around the neighborhood,
looping back around the streets like scribbles,
talking out the tangles, winding free
another layer
There is much to do, many miles
to unwalk, reclaim, release –
we will take it in stages,
come out again for another loop,
trace the path till everything comes clear.
©Wendy Mulhern
January 14, 2022
Truth is, I already miss the soil
and the sound of frogs
and walking on the land,
but as we walked the night suburban streets,
quiet, between the glowing houses,
the hwyl we’re learning still came through our feet,
still showed the way to walk in native power
We still walk in time
but maybe less so
as we are borne, as we become
the flowing stream,
the stories leave much less of an impression
while we’re living at the center of our being
Truth is, just like the river,
we’re flowing ever on towards home,
and everything we’re given
will find a way to come along.
©Wendy Mulhern
January 13, 2022
When you have to pay everything,
there’s no more counting cost,
no need, as there is no withholding
When you have to pay everything
because the cost is exactly
the whole of you,
you step across a threshold
to infinity
The things in daily life can’t tell you,
on their own, but somehow
you will come to know
you can’t be bought or sold,
can’t make a bargain of yourself,
and can’t be dolled,
and paying everything may be the price
for knowing that you always have been whole.
©Wendy Mulhern
January 12, 2022
Sometimes an image comes
in the colors you see
when your eyes close –
the purples where the lights were,
the glinting nets of dark green
Sometimes an image comes
while you’re looking at something
like rain from the roof edge
dripping, bouncing its drops
into a hole it has made in the earth
And you’re looking at that
and thinking of depth,
and the infinite care
of the Life that will stay with you
throughout the gravest of stages –
whatever can show you – and you alone –
so you will see it, how it is still there
And will make sure
you come to know it
in the fully satisfying way
that it knows you.
©Wendy Mulhern
January 11, 2022
A persuasion as delicate as
the scent of spring – the subtle catch
it has, on my hope, my longing –
would certainly be the thing
to lead with, the thing that would encourage you
to look up, look away
from rutted tracks, unthinking expectations
And see soft tendrils greening,
showing, by their reaching,
the existence of something we can’t see
but which they know is there
by the way the force within them
sends them hopeful and confident
to their source of nourishment and strength.
©Wendy Mulhern
January 10, 2022
We move in and out of noticing
while the elements of the day
move from grace to grace,
sun touched trees suddenly
dripping in beauty, flocks of birds
landing and flying, singing and calling,
frogs incongruous as January spring
In and out of dream, emotion, memory,
we move in waves – our day is braided
with these and what we observe –
sometimes they blot each other out
but sometimes they swell together,
their chorus sending us over some edge
where we float like a feather on flood tide.
©Wendy Mulhern
January 8, 2022
I’m delighted to announce an upcoming book event, to be held on Zoom. This is put on by Third Place Books, my favorite bookstore in the Seattle area. It is about my newest book, Time, and Times, and Half a Time. My talented illustrator, Susanna Maria Weiss, will also be there, and we will be interviewed by my dear friend Allie Pontrello. I invite you all to tune in – here’s the link:
https://www.thirdplacebooks.com/event/virtual-event-wendy-mulhern
It’s good to register if you think you might attend. I hope you can!