A rose may be shared,
as also, perhaps, a child,
or at least, the ties of motherhood

This didn’t come out as we expected,
did it, my love? But no matter —
it can be another thing we laugh about together

You, me, your dad, your brother —
we’ll all have a good laugh at this,
next time we get together,
next time we take a walk along the beach.

©Wendy Mulhern
May 13, 2018

Family folds us in
in ways we didn’t know we could expect,
nets of connection bear us up,
many arms embrace us

So the mending begins,
of holes we mostly can’t even see,
things that must be obvious to others —
places we are leaking,

Why we seem to need to keep sleeping,
simple tasks that seem impossible —
At some time we will have to rise up
and reassume our former mantles.
But for now we’ll let ourselves be held
circled up in other people’s care.

©Wendy Mulhern
April 29, 2018

I’ll take what is given,
this storm, with roaring winds
and rain that slaps itself through screens
and runs down panes,
this sleep,

these people whose threads
are so deeply interwoven with my fabric
that we feel each other’s tug,
each other’s strength,

this truth, which settles out
(today, in luminescent teal)
so clear, so unassailable,
awaiting, but not demanding
my surrender, my return
to where I was before the world began.

©Wendy Mulhern
April 27, 2018

We will sit
in the comfort of each other,
we will talk
of things we know,
we will find solace
in the solidness of bodies,
in the quiet light
of shared confidences

There is a way forward —
it may come in settling back,
back into what feeds our life flow,
the shared aquifer of truth.

©Wendy Mulhern
April 26, 2018