Today the artful wind
harnessed exuberance,
filled the early sky with roiling gold,
chased it, then, with dark showers,
burnished leaves whipped along the road
Then momentary blue, then
the full palette of fall’s splendor
lit up against the backdrop
of a gray sky
And I was nourished
by tunnels of color,
roads wreathed in leaves
above and under,
Fed by red, maroon, gold and umber,
eased into evening
by the sky’s
wind-swift turning.
©Wendy Mulhern
November 6, 2014
The temperature shifts quickly with the wind
which now blows dry leaves,
in soft, autumn-scented rustling,
down the street
The leaves that haven’t fallen
soak sun, silent and supple,
butter-smooth against
the china sky
And in between the times
when the industrious homeowner
wields his leaf blower,
It’s quiet, and I hear crickets
When the sun goes down
behind the Flatirons
I’ll seek warmth inside,
Settle, like nestled leaves,
into the evening.
©Wendy Mulhern
October 29, 2014
The size of the arc,
the span of life,
makes no difference
Sparks flittingly ascending,
stars ponderously wheeling
ancient pools, water-carved in rock,
a mushroom chalice
All these things
live equally intensely
through the exclamation of their being
All these things
can take you with them
All they require
is your seeing
©Wendy Mulhern
October 21, 2014
Crows going home
rise like loosed leaves
between the trees,
lifted as if blown
taking a free ride on the elements,
moving together in clan familiarity
Jovial caws speaking of evening
interrupt the reverie
from time to time,
counteract the sense
of wind being the only force
now that the last sun kiss
has left the sky.
©Wendy Mulhern
October 19, 2014
The day, already splendid,
increased its level of benevolence
with the braided glow
of rippled sun reflections
patterned by gulls and geese
in intersecting circles
and in looping Vs
And with a toddler’s foreign language,
the newness of his speech
the only thing that I could understand
And with the ease of afternoon
that spilled into the evening —
mid-October
and still not cold.
©Wendy Mulhern
October 16, 2014
We don’t make the sun rise
but it does
We don’t engineer
the seasons’ changing,
And even our internal tides —
our breath and circulation —
don’t depend on our arranging
(Pay attention, oh me of little faith!)
In the splendor of the rolling days,
the mist, the clouds’ drift,
the uplift of leaves driven by wind,
In the gentle hand of sun-warmth
on the dampened land
there should be evidence enough
This life of mine,
more vast than I can comprehend,
is held in order
by a force beyond my own
and all the flights I dream and yearn for
are established
not by my efforts
but by my essence,
not by me
but by the Love that holds us all.
©Wendy Mulhern
October 12, 2014
It’s suddenly the time of year
when the warmth of another
becomes attractive as fire
In the cold night air
The dark glow of you
draws me in. I curl
into the circle of your sleeping heat
Grateful to the bone.
©Wendy Mulhern
September 30, 2014
The chaff is not nothing
— nothing is nothing —
It has a history
It has a future
It follows the dispersing energy
along the edge of wind
It lands against a fence
and gives its final nutrients
back to the ground
Or it ignites
in one last sparking,
its light and heat
a parting gift
before it burns to ash
becoming even more diffuse
The wheat is weighty,
concentrated in,
It holds the seed of life
It holds the focused plan
It is prepared for next year’s season
to drink the draft of life and thrive
And those first blades it sends
in vibrant springing green
to take in sun
to make the next year’s seed
will then at season’s end grow dry,
becoming chaff
So goes the cycle
with nothing wasted
Nothing is nothing —
All that has loved
still has a value here,
still has a place.
©Wendy Mulhern
September 12, 2014
The coolness of the air
brings sudden autumn,
a memory as strong as taste
of longing, of excitement
for things that might unfold
as they are borne along the quickening
fall of the year into endings
or new beginnings
A taste of bracing challenges
and rising skill that meets them,
the ramping up of inner heat
to warm us through
the passage of the cold
and take us once again
around the turn.
©Wendy Mulhern
Sept 3, 2014
Crickets play the song of stars
their endless, tireless variation
close your eyes
and you still hear them shining
Stars sing in cricket voices
bringing the far away
so gently near
powerful and steadfast
clear as the dark sky
true as the night.
©Wendy Mulhern
August 27, 2014