Tag Archives: daily living

Reunion

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It was summer
and the bright, reaffirming waves
rolled down across everything
coursing through our limbs
bringing out the warm, languid affection
in which movement and laughter
flowed freely between us

It is summer again today
and we, reunited,
don’t need to work to make connection —
It’s here
in the liquid lines that join us
deeper than words,
deeper than roles,
deeper than thought.

©Wendy Mulhern
June 7, 2013


Evening, Home

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Well, I won’t dwell on
the little unravellings at the edges —
backwash of doubts about an interaction,
nagging thoughts of having done it wrong —

Better to remember
the afternoon light
and the touch of hands
with the home-soaring
but ever unexpected joy
that flew like swallows
from the moment of connection

Better to notice
how deep and ultimately unerring
is the impulse
that stands behind me
ready to pour out
from my eyes and mouth and fingertips
when I am attentive,
when I give consent.

©Wendy Mulhern
June 3, 2013


Seattle Sun

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The sun comes out
just in the evening
and it is like
giddy laughter after many tears
where you can feel your breathing
like a big drama
now the storm has cleared
though there’s no guarantee
the flood will not return
on the flash of some re-tripped remembrance.

The sun has come
too late to warm the earth
but old, tall trees
shake their shaggy limbs
in deep enjoyment
and send their glow
back through
my no longer spattered windows.

©Wendy Mulhern
May 28, 2013


Considering Life

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Maybe
it doesn’t matter
Maybe all the howling failures
and the little opportunities
that were missed
And all the things you didn’t say
or wished you hadn’t
Were just some of many shoots
put up in hope and exploration
from some much grander system underground
its purpose irrepressible
And some will thrive
and some will be cut off
but all will serve
and in the end, like the beginning,
Life will spring forth
making pathways for more and greater growth.
And we will bless,
each in our niche in time and space
and we will know
There’s no way we can fail
at grace.

©Wendy Mulhern
May 23, 2013


Impending Farewell

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It’s a different kind of sadness,
imagining you gone —
Not the gaping hole of
many times and talks, now missed,
But more the sense of
all we could have shared together
that we never did
and how the opportunity
will soon be lost —

A sadness bittersweeter
because lately
there have been a few times —
like pioneer species that grow in,
repairing ecosystems —
A few sweet shares,
A few bright laughs,
Some brave attempts to find again
the closeness
buried under several awkward years

And I can only hope
our separation,
like the drawn-out pauses
in a storyteller’s tale,
will pull us back together in an eager depth,
With our communication easy, broad, and clear.

©Wendy Mulhern
May 20, 2013


Working

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I was shoveling dirt
and hauling logs
and dragging brush,
and my legs were scratched
and my shoes were full of
rotted log dust,
and as I was pushing
the empty wheelbarrow
back into the back yard,
over the dandelions 
and forest ground cover,
back between the chest-high bracken ferns,
the air spoke to me,
its sweet warmth full of spring scent
with just enough breeze to cool my face.
It embraced me from outside
and filled me up within
so my limbs felt present and comforted,
and it said to me,
“This is exactly where you want to be,
this is exactly what you want to be doing.”
I had to agree.

©Wendy Mulhern
May 12, 2013


The edge of sleep

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I surface to the strobe-like pulse,
waking after nodding off —
Beneath my still-closed lids
I see a dancing form
bobbing away towards the edges of
my closed-eye vision
Maybe
I’m not, in fact, awake . . . 

(This afternoon, while I was napping on a bench,
my hand shielding my eyes
from the bright sunlight,
A dog woke me up
with a slight, deft lick on my face —
Woke me up, then bounded off . . .

I sat a while, a little dazed
by sun and wind
and sitting up quickly,
Then lay down for just a little more nap
before heading home.)

©Wendy Mulhern
May 1, 2013


Deep waters

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The river runs swifter
on this stretch between the high banks
And many
who have plied the currents confidently
all these years 
Still find themselves
unequal to its strength.
Their paddles catch,
Their little craft disintegrate
or founder,
They reach for other boats
Or sweep along alone
And the “I told you so”s of younger times
now sink, or echo, hollow
in their irony.
Before long, there’s no longer time
to think about the past
The river bears them onward
True to its own course.

©Wendy Mulhern
April 17, 2013


Little things rescue me

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“Glad I could help,”
says the smiling corner
of my daughter’s mouth
After she has talked me through
two cycles of distress.

A robin sings outside the jail.
I think it must have come
to comfort someone
up there in a cell . . . 

Inside, the guards are friendly:
“Need some stuff irradiated?
— Here you go!”
And through the glass, upstairs
I feel a spirit-heart connection.

Shafts of sun break in
from time to time, upon the day
Calm settles, and I write the needed letters.
Little things rescue me.
It doesn’t always take epiphany:
Sometimes the quiet confluences
are enough
to stop the crisis and reset my screen.

©Wendy Mulhern
April 16, 2013


Reconsidering

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Well, actually,
I don’t want to be the one
to do the talking
(Steam still rolling off of my indignant thoughts,
which mostly, to the mercy of the peace,
were never given breath)

I’m tired already, from their
pacing around inside the cage
of my surprise,
Rattling my words, finding them
deficient

It’s not enough that I deny them voice
They need to change, to find a higher mission
Somehow these thoughts
must all return to calm

So I consider:
Do I want to choose my friends, my loves,
on grounds of shared opinions,
so we can lie together
flat along the plane that we have chosen?

Or do I want to own
all the dimensions,
To spread out free, in an embrace
that hugs us all,
Transcending any scorn or condemnation?

Thank you. Right.
I won’t be duped to carrying that baggage on the plane
So I release all this from thought
to dwell in peace again.

©Wendy Mulhern
April 15, 2013