Going Home

We ended up going home.
Though we tried for a place
with more creature comforts,
the creature of us, it seems,
was most comforted by home

So we went there. As we go there
again tonight, yawning, the back seat
full of clean laundry, as we go there
continually on our life course,
our thoughts homing, our hearts
always setting that course.
We end up going home
iteratively, till we arrive.

©Wendy Mulhern
October 12, 2020

Sharing

I haven’t yet lived in a house
that birds want to fly into –
this one, being unfinished,
seems to offer enticements,
all these rafters, all these open spaces,
and the wind that makes itself at home here

These structures we make for ourselves
are not unnoticed by others –
they move in, they make a place for themselves,
as has always been intended
through all the time of living –
we make room for each other,
we share the land.

In Common

We are all alike –
the mice, the birds, the deer,
you and me –
moving through the rounds
of our days, gathering up
what we can use –

A bug,, a bud, a shaft of sunlight,
a song that pierces time and space,
we tremble in the liquid of our being,
we glow in our own radiance of grace

We all are earnest,
we all are laughable
in that particular way
each of us moves

We will be humbled,
we’ll be exalted
shining despite ourselves
down all the tumble home.

©Wendy Mulhern
April 14, 2020

For Sure

And this is what it feels like
to step out of my back door
into my backyard
and walk
to my friend, the oak tree,
sheltering many birds
which I hear more than see

Turkeys near the fence,
green springing up everywhere,
afternoon wind, though strong,
not cold

This is what it feels like to live here,
which maybe I do now
and sometime I will for sure.

©Wendy Mulhern
April 9, 2020

Third Day

From my window
I keep watching the snow —
it’s falling fast now,
large flakes swirling
forcefully from the south,
waves of it rushing
to catch up with itself,
covering footprints
as if it could fall fast enough
to outrun the coming rains
which will wash it all away
swift as it came

(I went out for long enough
to get my face wet
catching snowflakes in my mouth and hair —
I felt like I owed it
a longer homage
but I was also drawn
to the hearth fire.)

©Wendy Mulhern
January 15, 2020

Gentle

The gentle laws that hold us
don’t need us to understand —
we can have wildly different concepts,
we can have our faith placed
in all manner of nothings,
we can be full of worry
for all the ways those nothings let us down

The gentle truth is not impressed
by where our minds may roam —
whether we fall or climb,
whether we stall or rage,
whether we pine or ponder,
or place is still assured

The stillness, somehow,
will approach us, will wait,
will be there when we pause,
will catch us up in welcome arms,
settle us in
to where we’ll know for sure that we belong.

©Wendy Mulhern
December 21, 2019

I take my shoes off

Once again, I settle in to Soul,
the home that dwells in every moment
waiting to support, affirm,
waiting to release me

I take my shoes off.
I breathe deep. No longer
out of breath from sweating,
I can find the rhythm
of the full cycle. No longer pinned
under conflicting propositions,
I feel myself float. I let myself expand

It’s so freeing to remember
I am not enslaved. I owe no consequence,
have no indebtedness,
no fear, no shame —
my life is here in Soul,
and Soul knows my name.

©Wendy Mulhern
September 28, 2019

Home Within

You come home to yourself
and you may realize
you didn’t need to play those games
of measuring, of shoring yourself up,
you didn’t need to feel attacked or slighted

The clarity you felt in moments
when you saw another from the inside,
when you understood a way of moving
in centered calm and mastery —

That’s you — and it can lead you
safely through the clouds of doubt,
it can deliver you
before you even fall into confusion

It is you, and you can stay there,
secure in what you ever more will be,
home in yourself, and royal
all along the colored roads of life.

©Wendy Mulhern
September 13, 2019

We Call it Home

We call it home —
many other beings
call it home, too —
we find our place,
we make our peace,
we settle in
and start to know our neighbors

We make it home —
many other beings
make it home, too —
we make our place,
we find our peace,
we all are here
in concert with each other

We find it fine —
many other beings
find it fine, too —
we make our place,
we call our peace,
here in the verb
of work and living
the beaded strand of jeweled days.

©Wendy Mulhern
July 7, 2019

photo by Audrey Ruhland