I hesitate to put my whole weight
down on the answer,
not wanting, once again,
to feel the setback,
not, once again, to feel the back seep
of misplaced hope,
the backward look confirming
I never really launched
I hesitate, but heaven’s traces
do proclaim themselves around me.
There is goodness
everywhere there is thought.
Let me look forward,
let me be overwhelmed by evidence,
as has been promised,
as in heaven, so on earth.
©Wendy Mulhern
August 14, 2018
There’s a place for us at the table —
it’s not the raucous one, at the center of things.
It’s close enough to take in all the life
but far enough that we can move away
without a fuss, when we are done.
We circle, still, at the periphery,
and it feels good to be here
where we can observe but not be known,
where we can belong
but not be called upon.
©Wendy Mulhern
July 5, 2018
One day you’ll wake up feeling fine —
the dread that sullied
so many of your early mornings
gone — you’ll feel, within,
the strong light rising,
pure as blackbird song
For this, this bright upwelling,
is what you’re made of,
what you’re made for, too.
The thin veneer on which anxiety is etched
must wear away,
leaving nothing but the true,
which overcomes,
which carries all the days.
©Wendy Mulhern
June 17, 2018
These days the bottom falls out of us
at unexpected times.
It could be a good thing,
dropping us through
our soggy cardboard efforts
to hold ourselves together,
down to the waiting, changing land,
the rain and all the spreading seeping
and the tender sparkles
of returning morning sun.
©Wendy Mulhern
June 9, 2018
The land speaks to me
in insect hum
and in the chirps of birds
along their daily paths
The air speaks to me
in the awakened breath
of all that is alive,
that rises eagerly
from the patient soil
and makes itself known
The day speaks to me
in the steady shine
of its curving arc
as large and subtle
as the earth’s turning
It says, you will find peace
as you learn to be peace,
it says, come with me
and I’ll show you.
©Wendy Mulhern
June 7, 2018
Baby steps toward healing —
being able to talk about it,
recognizing there was nothing
we could have changed,
given what we understood then,
given what we knew
Nothing that, had we done differently,
could have brought a different outcome.
Nothing short of
the salvation of the whole world
could make a difference
So there it is —
what could have helped us then
can help us even now.
We turn around and face the place
where dawn will come.
©Wendy Mulhern
May 28, 2018
We walk hand in hand,
we look at trees in the park,
we feel the warmth of the sun.
Some things we don’t need to talk about,
some things we do
I had a dream in the morning
where our girl came back to us
at any age she wanted, at any time.
I counted it for true
and I was happy,
but it didn’t end the need to cry
There’s much more to us
than the stories we could make about ourselves.
Every part needs to come along with us,
every part needs to be healed.
©Wendy Mulhern
May 20, 2018
I will call it by its name.
I will not be afraid of it.
I will not fear that naming it
gives it power
I will not accept the ruse
that hiding it
could work in my favor,
I will not cringe around, masking my fear
that it may snake around and bite.
No. I will face it head on,
for it has no power
It is time for me to understand battle,
to array all of truth on my side
and not grant hidden force or mystery to evil,
but lay it bare and let it shrivel in the light.
©Wendy Mulhern
April 24, 2018
Hush. It is good
that we be quiet,
the better to hear the soft stirring,
underground, of swelling seeds,
the gentle parting of willing soil,
so recently too hard to move
It is good that we be quiet
to form the backdrop of gratitude
for the early warble of birds
unafraid to be first
to celebrate the dawn
In the sacred quiet, our hearts
relax from taut waiting,
even before we can otherwise sense
the springing forth
of our perennial grace.
©Wendy Mulhern
April 2, 2018
Let me wrap myself
in the arms of the city,
let me hold its four sides close,
let it determine everything around me,
let us rise again within, in hope
No one needs to slide off the roof,
no one need be ground up in the cogs,
these things have never held a corner here,
they can’t pull any of us under
Let this light keep radiating outward,
let it light us inwardly, besides,
and chime across the afternoon
the truth that will uplift us,
and bless us soundly, here where we abide.
©Wendy Mulhern
March 30, 2018