Maybe this is exactly
what I need — these waves
kicked over the sea wall,
these rain drops, hard as sand
blown against my eyelids,
this headwind beating me back
This could be what I need,
sun appearing at different parts
of the sea and sky, the mildness
of the gale-tossed air, my pedals,
even in low gear, offering resistance
This, so I can remember
I’m never asked to do it alone,
I’m only asked to lean in
and release.
©Wendy Mulhern
February 15, 2019
(to myself)
This lesson is for you alone —
don’t try to teach it
to anyone else. It is your job
to use these lenses
to see how this person
(the one with you or who you’re thinking of)
is blessed, beloved,
incomparable
And there’s no such thing
as needing to improve
(not even for you)
and it’s not your job
to make anything happen
and it’s not your virtue
when it does.
©Wendy Mulhern
January 16, 2019
Could be a place you call home,
could be a place you call memory,
could be a mirror,
could be the path of a stone
sinking deep in winter water
All these clouds have gathered
to view themselves,
to feel their loft,
to lend the pond another layer
of depth and luminosity
We will go deep, too,
because we love to,
and we will float high
because we, too,
include the sky.
©Wendy Mulhern
January 3, 2019
I don’t even feel like looking
at the end of the year —
I have no urging towards retrospectives.
I don’t want to look at next year, either —
I have no interest in resolutions
There will be things in the year,
events and growth and changes,
but I have no sense I can control them.
They will come through like storms
or sprout like seeds,
I will await them
but they will take me by surprise —
I have no view of them but this one,
on the ground, peering through vines and branches,
taking the next step.
©Wendy Mulhern
December 28, 2018
Because the pitching waves
and all the raw winds
and the destruction, and the sharp shards
were merely shadows,
shapes projected on our forms
We had been frightened
thinking each dark image falling on us
was a wound, a defect, or a dread curse
that we must overcome
But then we saw the same pictures
on everyone, and started to suspect
none of these flaws
had been internal
We started to reflect
on all the light within
and we became uncowed
by flickering shadows
So we became serene —
we have no battle.
Our sight is clear, our day is clean,
and we are free.
©Wendy Mulhern
December 15, 2018
And in the ponderous time
it seems to take
to do the simple tasks,
may we gain experience
in presence, and in gratitude,
in noticing, in overcoming
And how we find our rhythm
with all the things that don’t need clocks,
that arc along the day
according to their own grace,
the kiss of rain or sun
enough to crown their deeds.
©Wendy Mulhern
April 10, 2018
While some are struggling
to be alive, others
are struggling to be real
It is the same struggle —
though it may seem poles apart,
it is the same need
And while some may envy others their ease,
and others may not know to envy
the vitality that rises from the quick
when the cut is close to the bone
In the end they will be saved
in the same flood of light.
It may even feel to them
like they saved each other.
This is the nature of the blessing.
©Wendy Mulhern
March 3, 2018
In these days, our discussion
of things that we have learned
seems more a list
of things we have unlearned,
misconceptions we labored under
being shattered
by life’s happenings,
pictures reconstructed from the shards
assuming strange refractions,
showing different interpretations
We learn not to prescribe, and not to judge,
not to have a monolog
that strives to teach a lesson.
Most of all, not to think
our worth depends on what we do,
and not to think our failings
will make us fail.
©Wendy Mulhern
February 18, 2018
Ravens converse, traversing the valley,
clouds converge, crossing the sky,
in the close stillness of here and now
many things live hidden
A mind can be populated by opinions —
eyes look out, see only
what is set upon their curtains,
whole worlds can roll by unseen
but veils are sometimes lifted
The industry of mice, the vibrancy
of every effort creatures make
to be themselves, to thrive,
points to the uncounted ever-presence
resting, firm and gentle, on our days
Sun will grace us all —
no blinds, ultimately, close off our vision.
We will see the opening of comprehension
of how we’re woven, tenderly,
into our place.
©Wendy Mulhern
February 4, 2018
And I am suddenly
looking through the lattice work
of what I had intensely studied,
seeing new views, an opening out in the distance,
the way the structured pattern frames
things it doesn’t even touch,
the way those things
have a life of their own,
dimension and movement far beyond
the frame through which I view them,
a frame which, just a glance before,
I had thought was the only thing to look at.
©Wendy Mulhern
February 2, 2018