Tag Archives: grace

Forming

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Last light across the field,
glory again revealed  –
day by day we wend our way
toward gracious

What we see outside, within,
unveiled across the hours,
across the years –
the opportunity to see it glow with grace
in every beat of presence
steadily appears

Where we are now, partially unformed,
we’re still beloved  –
this early space where things seem messy
still reveals the lovely stuff we’re made of,
and shows the processes whereby
we rise to meet what loves us,
always welcome,
always welcomed home.

©Wendy Mulhern
November 15, 2023

The past, redeemed

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I get that stupid moments from my past –
ungainly words, unhealing silences,
don’t need to send a wound
down through my presence

We all deserve to be forgiven
for being out of touch, and for revealing it,
caught in the embarrassment
of our obtuseness,
tumbling suddenly
from what we thought was grace

While no resolve can guarantee
that I’ll do better,
this truth I have discovered:
my acuity can’t navigate
these fraught relations,
but Love, with ample grace,
smooths everything

And all of us are loved enough
that we can shine it to each other,
and innocently manifest the wisdom
that lets us share our love as we intend.

©Wendy Mulhern
September 25, 2023

Family dinner

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Grace fills this room.
All the things we’ve tried to do and be,
to be ourselves, to be together
in the dance of harmony,
contribute to the structure
of the embracing sphere

But we are held
within the stronger power
that draws our impulse,
bends our arcs
to make them flow together
exultant in the affirmation
that chimes through every touch,
bidding us relax,
ensuring our success.

©Wendy Mulhern
September 24, 2023

Birthday gifts

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The bright report of basil at my fingertips,
and fresh chopped garlic when I came inside,
were echoed in the sweet strains
of guitar strings tuning  –
all sending messages across the air

Then there was breakfast,
and there were songs played,
and there was conversation in the cool house

And then submergence
in a cold creek,
and heat to warm us when we came out

In early evening
the sunlight plays along the walls
while shadows outside scam impressions
(false for now) of cooling.
The contentment that embraced me
just a few days ago
still bathes my world. And truly, that’s enough.

©Wendy Mulhern
July 15, 2023

Life finds its way

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I find myself content with what I am
and what I have, maybe more so
because i didn’t feel it yesterday.

I come back to the dance around me,
back to where the summer air
is enough to stir up joy,
and the bounding growth
of plants under my care
feeds hope

One young buck,
coming by the door at evening,
velvet visible along his antlers,
seemed to show that,
even when it feels improbable,
life finds its way with elegance,
life finds its way for each of us,
gives us each our ways to go and come,
gives us each our elemental home.

©Wendy Mulhern
July 13, 2023

Greening

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I learn these things in tiny steps,
yet suddenly it seems,
after so much effort falling short,
things in my life are starting to come green

Shortcuts I took that lost the vital nuance,
the gaps that books’ advice would not fill in,
structures that I needed to acquire
in order to successfully begin …

This lack is slowly being overcome
by working long enough to start to see,
by putting in the steady, faithful, time
and learning how things grow and what they need,
by twining my own life in with this place –
leaf, tree, and vine, and daily grace.

©Wendy Mulhern
July 3, 2023

Family again

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And suddenly today
I feel the way I felt
when we were young  –
grown up and setting out to find
whatever was the journey that was called our lives,
and coming back together for a holiday,
the major strife of growing up behind us,
creating home with laughter, as families do

Today my sense of failing falls away,
and I see we have been living well –
each of us has our own sufficient pile
of life lived

And I see there is a grace
that doesn’t measure things like that –
grace that unfolds second by second
through all the seconds
in which we live.

©Wendy Mulhern
June 12, 2023

Moment

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I was walking outside
in that grace-touched moment
when the warming sun suddenly
brings out all the scents –
new grass and dried flowers,
blossom and resin,
and the air is still fresh enough
to carry each scent and deliver it
like a caress, eliciting
joy like birdsong,
high and acrobatic,
everything I’m learning reprised
in the sweet awareness of presence
and the priceless importance
of everything here.

©Wendy Mulhern
April 26, 2023

A Way

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We walk the fields together,
and many tasks could dog us –
dropped projects, ones we haven’t even started,
things that once were done
but now must be maintained

We see the green
that sprang up after snow,
we see the slope of ground,
the rise of trees

There is a way to look at all of this,
that we may master
as we practice with ourselves and with each other,
there may be
a way to harmonize all this
and see the springing grace inherent here.

©Wendy Mulhern
March 28, 2023