In the yearning to do more for you
than cry and cry,
I asked my angel daughter
to go to you,
to deliver you to the large place
she showed me,
where you can meet your daughter,
and she can laugh with you,
and your tears will change,
in the alchemy that changes everything,
in the equation that cancels out pain and death,
and they will be like sweet morning dew
at the dawn of eternal day.
©Wendy Mulhern
May 19, 2021
I ask myself, why should I be tempted
with sorrow? – as light rain joins with dusk
to dim the sky, and I walk down to cook supper
while I can still see a little,
and before everything gets fully wet
Why should I let this unnamed mesh
put up a catchment for impending tears?
– while I hold back reasons, noticing
that one or several
could launch me into self-indulgent sadness
It is written
that sorrow has its reward,
that if kept honest
(free of self pity’s stories)
it makes a basin to receive comfort –
comfort flowing in, cascading
all over the rims,
filling me up with acknowledgement –
how infinite its source!
©Wendy Mulhern
May 3, 2021
When I feel like curling up into a small ball,
when all I want are arms that will envelop me,
when tears are peering out my windows
edging for a place they can release
When I have cried until I stopped
and feel I might again,
and my outlook is too small
to take a long view,
and I have given up on stories,
so I have none,
and there’s no reason, nothing I can ask for
Let me remember
I can keep at this as long as I still want to,
I can let whatever triggers this
give all it has.
When it is all done,
I’ll feel the arms around me
and the steady, constant comfort
that they always give.
©Wendy Mulhern
April 5, 2021
I wanted to comfort
my seven year old self
as she walked the asphalt playground
singing a song to herself
to provide a good story
for why she walked alone,
never dreaming
what lines she had crossed
in the effort to excel
at a game with broken rules,
how her own scoffing at others
was what condemned her to her solitary lot
In comforting myself
I wish to comfort
every lonely one
(in their past or in their present)
who was skewered by the twisted rules,
tricked into condemning,
then finding themselves caught
on one side of the story or the other
I wish to tell us all
the game and all its rules are over –
all ye all ye in free –
come on home!
©Wendy Mulhern
March 22, 2021
The torn edge of paper
takes to the fire first,
leaps up in transformation,
starts the heat
that lights the kindling
till the logs ignite
Being torn can have its function,
for the comfort is right there
ready to leap up
and warm the whole place.
©Wendy Mulhern
March 10, 2021
Though I may think I want comfort,
I don’t really want
to be helpless,
don’t want someone
to swoop in and make things right
A better choice is fortitude –
to stride right into the fray,
to brave the cold, the smoke,
the mud – whatever calls forth
my need to persevere
For then that comfort
will also glow with confidence,
that comfort
will rest in tested strength.
©Wendy Mulhern
December 29, 2020
Come in, sit down –
there’s a place here
even for your tears
We can give you the comfort of darkness
where you don’t have to
control your features,
we can give you a blanket
the color of light behind closed eyes –
it can wrap you soft,
it will make room for you
When you’re done
you can come out –
there’s a place for you here too,
to let the warmth and light
lift the corners of your mouth back up
Come in, all you who are alone –
you can comfort us,
we’ll comfort you –
we call you even as we are called
to the place outside of space
where there is always room.
©Wendy Mulhern
December 24, 2020
The season’s comfort
is no more suppressed
by ignoring it
than rising water
finding its way up
through grass, through stones,
to catch and reflect
the light of the day
to flow down in richness
through courses before unseen
I’ve been ignoring the season
but not its comfort –
making no efforts to celebrate,
carried along just the same.
©Wendy Mulhern
December 19, 2020
I started to think about
what would be comfort –
end of day, sun gone down,
cold cabin waiting dark,
food to prepare
I started to picture it –
someone to care for me,
some place of light and warmth
where I could rest
The images slipped away quickly,
shifting and melting, canceling out,
till all I had left was a golden glow
and a feeling of worthiness
from having loved
So I knew that I had what I needed,
beyond and above the wood for the fire
and the place I could sit
and the noodles to eat
I knew that I had what I needed,
and that was comfort enough.
©Wendy Mulhern
December 6, 2020
I keep going down
looking for a truth
that’s bigger than your fear,
looking for the edge of the rock,
a place to pry it up,
for once I have the size of it,
I will find the all encompassing
blanket to wrap you up in –
you in, and the fear out,
the hole it came from gaping
like where a tooth was lost,
the ground around it soft …
I might do well to notice
that what can comfort you
has been here all along –
I can never know the size of it
but I can know for sure
it is enough.
©Wendy Mulhern
October 10, 2020