Help me to tell
a story of beauty
pointing a path of patterns
We could follow this one
and it might teach us
a generous weaving
We might learn a way to be together
better than the one we fell into
(projections of someone’s fears)
If given the first step,
we could follow it out.
If given the whole image,
we would glow
right here where we are
We would be the way and the light,
we could join hands
and walk out together.
©Wendy Mulhern
November 16, 2023
I am intrepid –
I want to do all the things –
no matter that I have so little practice –
I want to roll, I want to lift, I want to fly,
and I am willing to be taught,
willing to learn
So I proceed without judgment,
and with great forgiveness,
for myself as well as others,
and myself again, for having thoughts
that left me needing to forgive
We’ll learn this thing together
because we must,
for in the seams between,
the places where we join,
there is great power, and
a brilliant satisfaction
And what we bring into the practice
will become the gift we give,
to each other, to ourselves,
and to the whole.
©Wendy Mulhern
September 8, 2023
In my image of you,
your toes and wing tips
are dipped in gold –
you have a sheen about you
And you are held
in high regard
by all the threads
that weave you into place,
that hold your context
and your community
In my image of you,
you are blessed – it is a buoyancy
that lifts you clear above
any kind of judgment –
your very definition
is safe.
©Wendy Mulhern
December 5, 2022
The smooth hardness of the maple wood,
its solidness as I split it,
the songs I played while wielding
the axe and hammer
The little towhee
who flew into the window,
who I set upright and warmed
for a moment with my hand
before it flew off
Enough laughter to fill a face
so full that tears ran out,
time to listen and tell stories,
time to feel at home.
©Wendy Mulhern
February 18, 2022
Our hermit status
is not one we chose on purpose –
the closing portals of communication
were more like grass growing over,
and blackberry vines – things we thought
we’d attend to, when next – if only –
we could get the chance
But after a time I think maybe
we won’t even know
where the portals were,
won’t know how to open them up,
won’t remember, maybe,
why it would be
important to do so.
©Wendy Mulhern
April 7, 2021
Children emerge from the library
paired with parents
and two steps out the door
they invariably
break into running or dancing or singing,
bouncing against their parent’s staider gait
like leaves caught by the autumn breeze,
pent up from stillness
now released —
as rich a gift to me
as the tall oak trees,
resplendent red above,
speaking of community,
a place that cares for them.
©Wendy Mulhern
November 13, 2019
I guess I don’t know how
to pull myself together,
have no antidote
for centrifuge
I’m overcome
with feelings of expansion —
want shining love
for all these people,
want to understand
how this present light
fills them all with the overwhelming sense
that who they are
is just perfect
and how they look
is just fine
and what they give
is absolutely needed,
truly seen and gratefully received.
©Wendy Mulhern
August 21, 2019
Let me pause and consider
how grace is given us,
moment by moment,
day after day
Not as some rare prize
we came on by chance
or earned with great virtue
or masterful play
Grace is given —
it blesses us,
though we’re confounded
by how we occasioned it,
how it arrives
Grace we live in
will bless, too,
the others around us –
in blessing us, they, too,
will graciously thrive.
©Wendy Mulhern
June 25, 2019
In the story, the devil rubs his hands
and says, “I got her!”
but I will slip free —
I will not allow sticky webs
to be built in corners
anywhere in my mind
I will not allow any compartments
to limit the luminous goodness
I see in the face of my neighbors
and sense in the love that I feel
I won’t be drawn in to complaint,
for it hides the brightness inherent
in each one’s desire to be loved.
It’s easy enough to just love them
and let the devil lose.
©Wendy Mulhern
June 15, 2019
And as for us, poor fumble people,
all we need is cuddles,
cuddle of the deepest sort,
that feeds the soul,
that soothes the heart
and makes us know
how dearly we are held
We all come crying, masked, of course,
in our bravado, the efforts we all mount
to prove that we amount to something,
that our presence counts
We ask for others
to give us what we need
but they, too, flounder,
flailing in the chasm of their lack
Ah, if we only knew,
in truth, for certain,
what’s already given,
we wouldn’t need to struggle and to sink —
we’d rest, serenely, in our present heaven.
©Wendy Mulhern
February 10, 2019