Tag Archives: relationships

Safety

Posted on by
1

Look at the arches, consider
all the micro-trusts,
the leaning into,
at even the smallest scale,
that results in this entity,
this contiguity, this structure
in which we now take shelter

Is it not a miracle
that you know you’re safe here?
Is it not a thing to celebrate,
the way we both can trust
there is a place for us?

Indeed, I hardly understand
how these things happen, and why,
though I have an inkling
they are far more common
than our theories of their process
would support.

©Wendy Mulhern
May 11, 2017

April Snow

Posted on by
Reply

It can snow at the end of April
and people can find meaning
in travel to distant landscapes,
and unexpected lights of recognition
can travel between eyes

We are tentative like strangers,
careful not to offend,
we keep our yearning to feel like family
tucked deep, lest we engender
discomfort at our vulnerability

We think we sense
affection and appreciation,
we hope that we convey it,
not sure how to get beyond
the stiff hugs, the watchful smiles.
But we’re hopeful —
it can snow at the end of April
and it can thaw before May.

©Wendy Mulhern
April 30, 2017

Discovery

Posted on by
Reply

Joyful and relieved
to have abandoned
all my expectations,
I can delight in your colorful self,
your undetermined and undecided self,
the edges you have still to find,
your willingness to be
as yet unformed

I can rejoice that
none of this is up to me,
but all of it is wonderful,
masterwork of that which always
surpasses my imagination,
surprises my anticipation,
and holds it as a gift to all of us
the way you let yourself discover you.

©Wendy Mulhern
April 28, 2017

Lightening the Load

Posted on by
Reply

What can you make out of
old connections, letters from people
long lost track of? Is there value
in the warmth of their tone, the obvious
love they shared?

Is there a reason to hold on to words
whose context is long gone?
And is this related to hunger
that keeps coming back
however much I eat?

The past may be remembered or forgotten,
I can think of it with fondness or regret,
and maybe truly, all there is of it
is what I carry in my daily steps and breath.

©Wendy Mulhern
April 10, 2017

The Sharing Space

Posted on by
Reply

Let me remember once again
how to come into the sharing space,
to level the balance,
to leave outside
all impulse to steer
or to get you to change

I come into the sharing space
not with speech but with listening,
I enter the sacred
as seeker, as witness,
prepared to be overwhelmed,
lifted, transported,
prepared to be shined through,
prepared to be changed.

©Wendy Mulhern
April 2, 2017

The Same Stream

Posted on by
1

Feel the spreading distance,
my arms no longer reaching,
feel the melancholy seeping
as fingertips stretch empty

Feel the joining current
that holds each of us,
feel the way we’re flowing
in the same direction,
feel the sweet way our connection
is assured by simply coursing
in the same stream

Though the constellations of our friendships
may shift like clouds, may wander and disperse,
we’ll share the resonance
of what is filling us,
we’ll be the rushing song that fills our ears.

©Wendy Mulhern
April 1, 2017

If

Posted on by
Reply

If love is everywhere
then all the little
tubes and channels
we’ve devised
may be irrelevant —
we may not need
to jostle and twist
in efforts to achieve a perfect match,
may not need to write off thousands
who prove to have a different kind of thread

If love is everywhere,
we may be able
to bypass the conditions of engagement,
to deliver the sweet liquid of acceptance,
receive the luscious fruit we deeply crave.

©Wendy Mulhern
March 30, 2017

Progress Report

Posted on by
Reply

Mill Creek April

No lumps can stay
in the warm river of Love.

There is such a sweet laughter
when they have melted away,
when they have slid, effortlessly
into the oneness of the flow
and a look of understanding
replaces the conflicted look
of frightened defiance
masked by bravado

It’s such a simple connection
when we recognize
there’s never been a battle —
we’ve always shared the same purpose,
been carried
in the same design.

©Wendy Mulhern
August 21, 2016

One Moment

Posted on by
Reply

lagoon schoonerEvening brings
a chance of thunder,
a momentary glow,
last sun gleaming
on a boat’s white hull

Memory offers
people hardly even listening
while waiting to be seen,
to be heard, to be known

Wisdom intones
No one needs coaching
on how to be.
It’s never right to ask,
how are you doing
at learning to forgive?

I must honor
the cloak of respect,
must honor your quiet space,
big enough for you to twirl around in,
big enough for you to turn three times
to make a nest of long grasses
in which to sleep,
big enough to fling yourself down,
to howl, to moan, to cry,
or not. It’s OK for you to just sit there, too.
It isn’t mine to pry.

©Wendy Mulhern
July 18, 2016

Stitches

Posted on by
1

sky and fir

I’ve laid my needle down.
From here on out, I will not try
to stitch together separating clouds,
I will not stab
at what I, after all,
have no perspective
to clearly understand

The atmosphere has its own laws —
the vapors move on lines of pressure
I can’t see,
and even clouds with massive gaps between them
are still united in the common sky

As for this poem,
I’m not sure what I even meant,
and so it’s hard to know how it should end.

©Wendy Mulhern
May 19, 2016