It’s a good time
for me to be quiet.
It’s right to notice how bombastic
some of my voices can be —
they like to turn everything
into a lesson, so they can
be the teacher,
so they can feel that exalted
sliver of space between themselves
and those they would instruct.
Humility is required,
and that may mean
keeping my mouth shut
for what may seem
a very, very long time.
©Wendy Mulhern
March 9, 2017
Tempted to throw myself
into the sea again,
feeling the waters
behind my eyes
wanting to join
the seething ebb and flow —
I remind them that this is not
inevitable,
they would only be lost,
as would I,
by taking such a dive
There is a place for me
here at the helm of thought,
making the subtle distinctions
of perception,
ready with the course corrections
that will keep my ship from foundering
and deliver my proof
of the power of the higher Mind
for the greater good.
©Wendy Mulhern
March 3, 2017
And in the steady walk of days
you might suddenly be able
to move more swiftly,
quickly slipping into
some embodiment of your self
you never had been sure
how you could get to
Life seems so routine, then suddenly.
Grasp this now, for who knows when?
If it’s not here yet, keep on walking.
Time doesn’t own you, so . . .
The engine of your heart’s desire
is always humming in the background,
purrs or lurches you along whether or not
you’re holding it in mind.
Time doesn’t own you, but it watches —
Your unfoldment is a good show.
©Wendy Mulhern
February 20, 2017
Things can happen
that will make you give up thinking
you have any say
in the design and development
of yourself, your body, your character
Which can be good, because then
you won’t keep thinking
you should have done better
or that you deserve to suffer
or at least not live as well as you would
if only you would do better
for yourself
The day you realize
it’s entirely out of your hands,
it’s crucial to also know
the One whose hands it’s in
never wants you to suffer,
never uses pain as a tool,
always intends your full delight and satisfaction
and is delighted and satisfied with you
Then you see
no pain can win,
no disability can triumph.
you are able, head to toe,
you are loved, spine to sky,
your are held in the open space
of your belonging,
before you even start to try.
©Wendy Mulhern
January 11, 2017
Let’s ride with glee
on our small spurts of progress,
like the first time, on a unicycle,
I rode three feet unaided —
Yes! This is a milestone —
it’s worth the exhilaration
even if I’m not ready yet
to join the circus
Success builds on success
like seedling leaves that sprout
from cotyledons and grow bigger,
each of them with a potential
new leaf behind its ear
We can celebrate
today’s small gains —
they will propel us
through the year.
©Wendy Mulhern
January 5, 2017
The atmosphere of my temple
is my choice. If I feel clouded,
if I can’t find the joy amid the sorrow
of my story, if the words I use
to help remember what I am
fall flat, if it seems that things
far beyond my control are at fault,
this is what I must remember
The atmosphere of my temple
is my choice. I can choose now
to let the story lie inert,
a sleeve with no breath in it.
I can choose to let warm infinity
fill me in tones of gold and orange,
I can let my peace rest, soft, around me.
I can turn away from words
to that which doesn’t need them,
I can fill my temple
with what I live to feel.
©Wendy Mulhern
December 25, 2016
When we thought we walked on solid ground,
our world was full of dramas —
so many things that could go right or wrong,
and underneath them,
the persistent weight
of hopes that never quite vaulted
to their victories, and the resultant lowering,
over weeks and years,
of the ceiling of our possibilities
As we began to learn that substance
is something else,
that what we thought we walked on
was separating, like melting floes,
but we were still standing,
the dramas, too, took on a different meaning
Things still matter to us deeply
but not so much for turns of plot
as for the places, shining through everything,
where our truth transforms the story,
where we prove that we are free.
©Wendy Mulhern
December 23, 2016
Today, again, I claim my freedom.
I have to do it every day,
there are so many crafty voices
that try to whittle it away
Yesterday I claimed my freedom
to be a neighbor. To walk up to the doors
(and some of them felt ominous)
and knock, and introduce myself,
though I’ve lived here for years,
letting my silence overgrow like vines
around the house, binding me
in scarcely whispered fears
Today I claimed my freedom
to be unperturbed in traffic,
to be calm and watch the scene
like so many psychedelic windows
unfolding moving imagery,
and I was free to take it in
with no annoyance, no need
to tensely grip the wheel.
I let the day unreel
what it would reveal
Tomorrow, too, will have its opportunity
for me to further understand how I am free.
©Wendy Mulhern
November 30, 2016
Even the inscrutable
can seem familiar —-
I can get used to the sounds of words
and not notice
I don’t know what they mean
or that, knowing the words,
I still don’t know the sense
Maybe I’ve patched some meaning on it,
an image that comes with the words,
maybe I read them thinking
of a conversation, or my afternoon
I have gone years that way
and missed, each time, the key dimension
that opens out the hidden laws,
the promised order
And if I find them,
suddenly I fly
with lift I didn’t know was there,
enlightened eyes,
and every word brings clarity
and secrets fall away like dreams —
in awe I trace the outlines
of reality.
©Wendy Mulhern
November 15, 2016
This standing watch
is not without its distractions
but I am starting to learn
not to go barking off after decoys,
not to be taken from the inside
by what calls itself indignation,
what calls itself wounds,
not to be undermined
by complacency, and not to be
thrown off course by blame
I will watch to see
that no lies about anyone
can obscure their precious essence,
and no caul of helplessness
can obstruct our needed action
I appeal to the Truth
that knows more than I do
about these things
and will flood out
all the obfuscation
with its light.
©Wendy Mulhern
November 12, 2016