Something leaps up quick
behind my eyes. It could be tears,
the slow sting of memories,
could be frustration,
but every time I head down that path,
it seems I end up
in the same place
I taste that missing someone
is bittersweet. The sweetness
is indeed a potent force,
the sorrow seeping slightly after,
not overwhelming the brightness
but softening it.
©Wendy Mulhern
January 17, 2019
Though you may fall and fall
through the bars of memory,
hitting at moments, going back and down
Though you may feel
striped beyond redemption,
branded by the light and dark,
strobed to instability
You cannot fail.
This is not about you —
it’s about your Maker,
and your Maker knows you whole.
©Wendy Mulhern
October 31, 2018
Blessed and at peace
in the sweet time of closure,
end of day, work done,
I feel you near me,
droll and kind
We have come along this way together,
you, of late, making your presence known
as light, as gentle impulse,
as patient humor at my dim grasp
of what you know so well
We will be together
now and continually,
and more fully,
the more I comprehend.
©Wendy Mulhern
October 24, 2018
I hold you as a frame,
as branches frame a far off scene,
as a path frames the woods,
showing the exquisite composition
of the view
and turkeys, browsing every day
along that path, frame the afternoon
I see feathers. They fall from the sky
or are found, in delicate perfection,
along a road, beside the lake.
I take them as signs.
I think of you every day.
©Wendy Mulhern
August 31, 2018
You’re looking for connection
in a cosmic sense,
like a lost lover in a story,
a lost father actually,
seeking his daughter
across oceans, across skies
It’s archetypal
and it opens up the portals
into other worlds —
your longing has already
crossed the bridge
so you can’t live easy here
Can’t confine yourself,
have to accept that you’ve expanded,
have to learn to move and feel
in the world where she is,
must be reunited
in the larger sphere.
©Wendy Mulhern
August 19, 2018
Here is a thing that is beautiful:
your life, and what it proved,
what it establishes, even now —
that no one ever has to think
their presence is expendable,
their friendship unneeded
or unwanted
You are here
with your ready hug
and your deep empathy,
and you have showed us
that no one needs to wait to love
and no one has to wait
to be beloved
So we go back along the weaving of a life,
the places in the past where strands have tangled,
we pick them up and lay them back in place
gently and deftly, as your hands always moved
We set things right
all along the years,
we feel in doing this
that you are here.
©Wendy Mulhern
August 8, 2018
Nobody knew the right thing to do.
Lots of people would have had stuff to say,
opinions on appropriate directions
Where was my intuition?
Why had I not been honing it through many years?
How could I have thought
it was unreachable or optional?
If I had known better,
could I have done better?
If I had done better
where might we be?
This wave comes over me and passes through
and in its ebb I feel again
how I was grounded.
There will be other waves —
when they recede
the light will gleam again along the sheening sand.
©Wendy Mulhern
July 20, 2018
When I can remember
how time turns out to be
nothing at all,
how the wholeness of you
was complete before we knew you,
continued so, all throughout that span
and is so now,
then I can feel
the joy of your being
that touched so many moments
and blessed so many hearts
so thoroughly, then as now,
and I can know
a similar purpose
attends each of us.
Your light can still
guide us there.
©Wendy Mulhern
July 7, 2018
You will bring us joy every day,
long beyond the tears,
joy of presence, joy of spirit,
joy of every sweet thing
we learn from you
You still bring us
the hum of strong connection,
the swift running of emotion
and the sense of how important
all this is. Not schemes and plans
but simple daily being with each other,
you still teach us
every time we greet you in our hearts.
©Wendy Mulhern
May 26, 2018
We know you will go on,
we know you will keep learning,
and we can consider
that you will share
your inspirations and your joys with us,
just as you did before
We will go on,
we will keep learning,
so we’ll have things to share
next time we come together,
when we meet again.
©Wendy Mulhern
May 4, 2018