Morning has its faithfulness,
and even before dawn
as the gibbous moon still shines,
the turkeys are set off
by any other sound — the geese,
another flock of turkeys,
tiny songbirds, the occasional duck
Even before dawn
cars and trucks are trundling
down Marcola road along the river
We are up earlier
than our rustic lives would order,
preparing for errands in town
and to get back to planting
before the rain.
©Wendy Mulhern
March 13, 2020
This wilderness was prepared
especially for me,
like the belly of a fish
but not so dark and slimy
This wilderness
holds me cocooned
in the place that best promotes
my growth. No room to squiggle,
no chance to be distracted,
to opt out. No way to go
but forward, upward
along the tough but bracing trail
This wilderness
leaves no space for complaint,
Its beauty overwhelms me,
its demands
make me strong. I will stay here
for as long as is required.
I will stay until directed to the city.
©Wendy Mulhern
November 9, 2019
Long we have imagined being done
(not even comprehensively, but with a phase)
Long we have imagined going home.
But there’s a truth about the process
we didn’t know to picture —
how we don’t go back the way we’ve come
We have been honed, we have been humbled,
and the things we’ve learned
are more about perspective points than anything —
not that we know more things
but that our lenses
have somehow shifted everything we see
And being done — I now don’t know
what that would look like,
and going home — I’m not sure
where that is,
but in the learning and the leaning
I can say
I’m more myself than I have ever been.
©Wendy Mulhern
November 4, 2019
The softness of the day at three
is a fine gift — softness of wind,
warmth from the sun,
a softening of urgency
to get things done,
a sense of progress,
a sense that our release,
while not in sight as yet,
could come some day.
©Wendy Mulhern
November 3, 2019
Subtly, the palette changes —
bracken ferns to brown,
grasses back to green,
gold and orange along the river,
water vapor’s silver sheen
We raced the rain
all day yesterday
while the sun slowly made room
for more and more clouds
and the cat hunted happy in the field
and the needed tasks got done
And this morning,
rain holding off for just a while,
you added final touches
so now we can look up
and see the colors
and watch the rain.
©Wendy Mulhern
October 16, 2019
We go each day to the house
to see how we will be built,
what skills and insight, what endurance
will arise in us to meet the day’s demands
For we do not come static
to any task, nor do we come
with a collected stash of virtue
to test ourselves against what is required
We come to grow, we come to change,
we come to learn,
we come to be made new,
to be transformed,
and more than what we make
with wood and nails and stone,
this will be our building,
this will be our home.
©Wendy Mulhern
September 24, 2019
The rain has given us a break —
we work in silence,
finding it more harmonious
than the questions and projections
that would otherwise fill up the space
No need to annoy each other,
no need to talk about the things we cannot know.
After the window closes,
we’ll do the next thing that makes sense,
taking in the necessary factors
that will reveal themselves by then.
©Wendy Mulhern
September 16, 2019
The straight line of our intent
begins to meet the season’s curve —
bracken fern starting to turn,
and trees along the river
Garden plants have given up,
the coming rain too late,
other factors we can’t see
informing them
their time of growth is over
No longer can we count on
stretches of long, sunny days —
they shorten, and the rains
begin to take their place
We will bend, because we have to,
we will find a way,
our intent will weave itself in,
for the circle belongs to us, too.
©Wendy Mulhern
September 8, 2019
Standing under the porch roof
I aimed my camera
and tried to catch a lightening bolt
I failed, though I saw five of them
— lack of faith, perhaps,
in my ability, or in the likelihood
that it would strike again
Wind brought the smell of rain
(though it rained little)
and relief, if for the moment,
from the sultry stillness
and the thickness
of the thunder-laden air
To have a roof over our heads
is cause for gratitude,
which marks how far we’ve come
and gives a standpoint from which
we can receive more.
©Wendy Mulhern
September 5, 2019
Afterwards, what I kept pondering
was the jewel in the storm,
the calm that could only be discovered
amid the raging, the peace
the storm brought out
by failing to ruffle it
even in the least
This is a thing to know about,
this is a thing to remember
even in lesser storms,
and when there’s no storm at all.
©Wendy Mulhern
August 29, 2019