Tag Archives: permaculture

Chaff and Wheat

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wheat and chaff

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

Hope Sandwich (on desperation toast)

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hope sandwich

The grid has shaped us broken —
We find our angled edges only fit
with others who are similarly maimed.
We cry out in our pain and our frustration
and find our cries just shape more of the same

We try to think of starting over,
Try to see a way
to pattern something new,
But all our edges dig into the injured soil,
compact it more, erode it, stir up dust

There is a river,
There is another way,
There still are headlands that are wild.
We need to find those headlands
in our minds —
That’s where we start,
That’s where we stay

It’s not so much a work of starting over
(These trees are here, they’ve grown for years)
So much as moving now
along our truer channels
thus reinforcing all the good that’s here

But now it’s time to cry —
Cry tears, cry out —
anything to be less stuck, less dry.
With all my voice that’s left, this shout
for help. I can’t do this alone.
. . . And so to wait, until direction comes.

©Wendy Mulhern
August 11, 2014

Wheat, Tares, Chaff

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In the growing, in the harvest,
in the winnowing,
love is the only tool

Life’s circles, and life’s cycles
are respected —
the small rain on the tender herb,
the showers on the grass,
the tares and wheat, side by side
before the harvest,
letting life flow up
from sprout to blade,
from stalk to seed —
All things that are alive
are sheltered, hallowed.

In the time of harvest,
when the seed is finished
and the stalk is done
and the casings have performed
their vital work,
When everything except the seed
grows dry,

Then comes the winnowing
when chaff is blown away,
while all those life-kernels,
protected and aided till they reached fruition,
remain —
Love’s masterwork:
encapsulated power of life
to rise again.

©Wendy Mulhern
July 10, 2014

Germination

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germination

In this uncharted place,
Seeds are my teachers —
Some have given their lives
for my learning,
teaching, in their dying,
what they needed

As for me, what I owe
is rapt attention —
I can’t assume I know a single thing —
This humble openness
is my gift
in which a seed may sprout —
I must maintain it
free of arrogance,
free of crippling doubt

They are so small
to command
so much of my time!
I imagine each of them
a fruiting plant, a meal,
a harvest . . .

My understanding
is a tiny grain,
A well-soaked seed
ready to sprout —
So much it needs to grow
to be robust, a living system
thriving on its own,
that will let me nurture life
with what I know.

©Wendy Mulhern
April 6, 2014

If the Web is Strong

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forest

If the web is strong
the storms that come
will do no damage to the land

The rain will slap
against the earth’s soft blanket
while underneath
the tiny bugs will thrive
in humid comfort

And wind will lash
the shaggy trees
and they will give, in grace,
And underneath,
for all the smaller living things,
they’ll hold the quiet

If the web is strong,
the energy
will pass from hand to hand
and be absorbed
and add its eager strength
into the earth.

©Wendy Mulhern
March 21, 2014

Ways of Knowing

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Things may be much larger
or much smaller
than we assume —
Maybe it’s a galaxy,
maybe a quark,
maybe the shake of a squirrel’s tail
among the boughs

Some instruments of knowing
are less foolproof
than we have been led to believe,
and indeed
we have been fooled for generations —
We have been duped
into throwing out
all ways of knowing,
all ways of measuring,
all ways of valuing
except the dollar
(and that, we’re told,
is out of our control)

And yet
We are not fools,
We do have ways of knowing
of our own
And we can use them
to understand
each one’s true value
and why we’re here
and what we now can do
to save the world.

©Wendy Mulhern
February 18, 2014

At the core

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Oh, we are all the same,
heart of lettuce, core of onion, carrot top —
We have our generative essence,
we will grow
from this central point,
put out our leaves
and reach into the soil
for what we need

But we’re not made to thrive alone —
Our growth, beyond our spark,
requires some need our presence meets,
some gift which, when we give it,
cantilevers strength for us and them

This web we share —
How it breathes,
the giving and receiving
in ecstatic rise and fall,
how intricate its network,
how tenderly it holds us all!

©Wendy Mulhern
January 29, 2014

Work Party

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Afterwards, we drove up through
the scattered, shattered landscape,
houses like detritus flung against the fences
of suburban grids,
the actual people
clinging for survival
to the few pursuits that patch
their massive loneliness,
and maybe they don’t even know
the tide has gone out on their sustenance . . .

We thought about city repair,
and the work seemed so massive —
to create a structure
that belongs to us
and not the advertisers and investors.

But we have begun:
In this day we worked together
moving earth, transplanting hope
(represented here by many strawberries),
making connections which, with care
will spread in a great mat
and bear its fruit where everyone can share.

©Wendy Mulhern
January 18, 2014

Becoming Real

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We start to consider
what it will take to become real,
what it will take to release ourselves
from the role in the story
in which we have no power
to infuse the structure
with our integrity,
no power to ensure
our livelihood is built on justice.

We will become real
because we do have power.
We must build our world from scratch
because it can be right,
and we’re not living
till we own
all the consequences
of our actions,
till they reflect
our natural, steady,
all-embracing care.

©Wendy Mulhern
January 4, 2014

The Law of Home

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We had been taught we had to buy our homes
in the currency of servitude,
our souls indentured for security,
our freedom traded to be warm and dry.

What liberation to discover
there’s a higher law,
to find we make our homes
from what we are.

We make our homes
from what we are:
Like coral, like clams,
we grow our shelter
from the soft sweetness of ourselves
and from our interface
with the vast and seething breathing
of currents rushing through us

We make our homes
in the power of our thought,
conceiving them as we conceive ourselves
inseparable from innate belonging.

We make our homes to hold ourselves together
and keep us where the flow of life
will constantly enliven us.

No way to be homeless,
no need to be fooled:
It isn’t commerce that protects us
but the law of home,
written in the timeless code
of water, waves, and stars.

©Wendy Mulhern
December 27, 2013