Tag Archives: revolution

Visiting hour, King County Jail

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None of these restraints are what they seem:
Though we may feel the structure is
the walls and doors, the iron and the glass,
the heavy locks,
They only are projections of the barriers inside —
The layers upon layers of revoked permissions
set down since toddlerhood,
And the narrow mazes of propriety
inculcated through all our years of school,
Reared up here as final ultimatum:
Stay in the lines, or you will crash, hard, here.

But none of these structures
are what they seem.
Such a surprise to see the guards,
The sentinels of good-defined-by-evil,
Jealous keepers of prescribed morality
Receiving our sweet, wilting, proffered flowers
and stepping over
to our side.

The power of the truth within,
The still, small voice of liberty
Autopoiesis of each living thing
Must overcome these walls and set us free.
Yes, we will pray.
That’s where we must begin.
Against these odds
it is the only way to win.

©Wendy Mulhern
March 12, 2013


Standing

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We’ve been through this before
but this time we’re wiser
and will stand unflinching
as all those shapes pass through us —
those illusions of ourselves,
walking and moving
but absent our deep desire —
ourselves moving in tracks
set up to have us shuffle
mostly mindless,
mostly lifeless,
through our days

This time we won’t 
fall in step with them
For our roots reach down
so much deeper —
through rocks, through magma,
to the mingling with the very core of things,
And our crowns,
full as the most established of the guardian trees —
Our crowns dance with the stars.

©Wendy Mulhern
March 5, 2013


You Must Not Hide Your Power

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No, you must not hide your power
Nor stuff it in a shell of smallness
in some attempt at bland conformity;
Must not succumb to thoughts that say
To cloak your power 
would make you more like others,
More acceptable, more lovable,
Deserving of more care —
That, to fit in, you must be small like them.

No one is small!
And you must not be fooled
by shells that make them seem so
or games that shells may seem to play.

If you stand up
And breathe into the depth
of your own power
You will awaken
a rush of recognition
And hear the ripping
of all the shells of smallness
Cracking open, falling off from all the others
Who each have found their power
And now step free.

©Wendy Mulhern
February 17, 2013


Ruses

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The touted need of dark to hide the light
has many ruses.
One of them seeks to define
the light’s uses —
tries to say it serves
(or doesn’t)
to bring advantage
in the twisted logic of the cruel games
that we’ve been duped to thinking
are our lives

Where to the light, there is no game
No win and lose
No rules, no shame
And as for dark
It has no teeth
and no desire
to hide the light.
It meekly waits —
Transparent depth
through which all light can effortlessly shine.

©Wendy Mulhern
December 24, 2012


Releasing Light

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In the enslavement 
to which we’re bound
(held down by loops of thought
cleverly designed to make us think
they are our own)
We’re trained we’re only due a little light —
Strings of little lights at Christmas
Rare and hard-earned smiles, short vacations
A glimmering of satisfaction
coming up through layers and layers
of drudgery
Only one love in life
and no more loved ones
than we can count on a hand or two.

Why not throw off the loops?
Why not abandon
the voice that says
“How dare you? How dare you think
that you could have some more?
Why not claim
for ourselves and everyone else
all the light —
All the light that we are!

©Wendy Mulhern
December 5, 2012


Preparing for a storm

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We have done this many times before
Set our house in order
Hunkered down
Loose ends put away
Extra anchors set, and ties
to hold down everything 
that could be borne away

Most often it has passed us by —
The next day dedicated
to putting all things back to order
Reopening, resetting our displays
The busy tasks fast filling up our days

But this time could be worse
Thoughts turn toward cyclones
Making us stay low
While yet we scan the sea, the sky
Tsunami warnings urging us
to go high

And we can’t know what we will do
if suddenly our landscape is completely changed
and all the things we trusted to are gone
and we become
like all the other sufferers
who don’t know how
to claim the rights we took for granted
until now.

©Wendy Mulhern
November 6, 2012

America Blues

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You only lose if you lose heart,
I told him —
It was a good Sunday School lesson,
and he agreed
He’d seen his teammates flag
but he had rallied
Made five goals to bring his team up to a tie
(being a better shot than many seventh graders,
he confided.)

You only lose if you lose heart
And here I am
In the face of all these lies
that up to half our country
seem to have swallowed
And the bought campaigns
meekly reported in the news
as if they were legitimate

And I am at a loss for heart
All the deep sighs
that keep escaping me
And the head-bowed stupor
that keeps engulfing me
And my feeble protest
as if someone would hear
Will do no good
If I’m to help us rally
I need to find my heart.

©Wendy Mulhern
November 4, 2012


Sovereign

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Be alert but not afraid:
The wily lies with their insinuations
that try to catch you in the snare
of sorrow, slavery, and tiresome machinations
cannot intrude upon your power

As long as you are clear that you are free
and let no contradiction sit within
then nothing from outside of you can squelch you:
Like sprouts that break the concrete,
you will win

You will stay sovereign
when you know
there’s nothing that can undermine your soul
and since the heart of you is ever whole
no lie of brokenness can take control

Be alert but not afraid
for in the love with which you’re made
you can resist each lie that says
you’re any less than you.

©Wendy Mulhern
October 31, 2012


Who rules you?

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If God is a tyrant
It doesn’t matter who rules you —
which voices, external or internal
bear down on you
bend you to their yoke
You have no hope for freedom anyway
Only the hope of bargaining
for some marginally less paltry
slice of life

But if there is freedom anywhere
If there is fulfillment
If there is any love, any bright joy
Then something must be holding up the ceiling
of the sky
Some law must make provision
for dynamic lift

If God were a tyrant
There would be no point in life at all
But Life rises
irrepressible
and joy is real, and comes unbidden
Flashes of brilliant day
take us by surprise
proving
God is not a tyrant
and you can have
everything you love.

©Wendy Mulhern
October 25, 2012


Step Two: Overcome Atomization*

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Oh comrades!
Look what has been done to us
The “news” reports of crime
the ever-broadcast warnings
so far more frequent 
than the actual events
inculcate, with alarm, their daily message:
“Fear your neighbor
Fear the foreigners — they hate you
Fear the poor — they want your stuff
Fear everything that’s not controlled by Us”

Other voices of “authority” chime in:
“Fear your body
Fear your inner voices
Fear your desires, distrust your heart’s choices
Look to us for your allotted goodness,
the very little you deserve.”

Comrades! Look what these words
have done to us
They’ve taken even this —
The names we had for fellowship —
Made them evil

But we can overcome and stand together
Conquer each internal fear
Engage our courage
with small displays of unity
Build up our trust
for each other, for ourselves
and for our goodness
We shall overcome
because we must.

©Wendy Mulhern
October 23, 2012

*From From Dictatorship to Democracy, by Gene Sharp