Tag Archives: story

New Sight

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I will turn all the pictures in.
I will set my eyes to see
at cross dimensions,
in places that cut between,
that take the same colors
but make of them a wholly different story

Every story told in terms of good and bad
will change to true accounts of fine engagement —
they will sparkle easy grace
and glow with an intensity of depth,
they will shine with courage and surrender —
courage in how much we give for love,
surrender as we recognize
we never need to earn it

There won’t be anything there
that puts us in a bad light,
for there we will be seen for what we are.

©Wendy Mulhern
September 27, 2019

Day of Freedom

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And now I’ll tell you of the time
when we all took off our crooked glasses
and shook our heads to focus our surprise
and spent some puzzled moments
trying to readjust our eyes
but then admitted
that here and now, as never
in our prior experience,
we could see

— because no longer did we need to fear
what someone else might think of us,
no longer did we need to squint
to weigh each other in the scales,
no longer did we think that judging others
was something we or anyone
was tasked to do

So we were free —
free to move with all the strength
and competence, and sweet compassion
that we always dreamed comprised our being,
free to love, with no fear of rejection,
free to trust our clarity of seeing.

©Wendy Mulhern
July 21, 2019

My ipod serves up love songs on the plane

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I listen and my empathy
follows the threads of passion
(threads like water veins
upon the land below,
the rivers, lakes, the melting snow,
the cities clustered there, along the roads)

I feel the longing and the pain,
I feel the exaltation —
my spirit hums an all-embracing chord
that circles round the threads
and drops beneath,
enfolding them in overarching blue.

©Wendy Mulhern
April 24, 2019

Even So

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If every life story
turns out not to matter,
if none of the shocks and the falls
or the haunting doubts
or the lonely lows
can make any mark on your being

If none of your items of pride
with their giddy highs,
their sidelong looks
(weighing your relative worth)
are anything you can protect,
anything that can remain

Still you will find
that the spark of your love
and all you’re compelled to defend,
your unplumbable worth
and the need for your presence
shine in Life’s eyes without end.

©Wendy Mulhern
April 17, 2019

The closest thing to a night without a poem

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Days like this
it’s a good thing
it’s not up to me
to keep myself going

I would shrivel up, no doubt,
or wander aimlessly
toward the next thing
to put in my mouth,
would stumble around
from armchair to couch

I would be hopeless according to
all standards of achievement.
But here is the marvel:
it’s not up to me. And here
is the moral: there’s no need
to hound myself (or anyone).
Our presence and goodness
are assured. Just not by us.

©Wendy Mulhern
March 24, 2019

Never again needing

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It’s no small thing that we are given,
an afternoon with wind and ravens,
wind occasioning the dance of gracious firs,
ravens giving distant comment

There’s more — the blue of sky,
the blessing of companion hammocks,
the sense of never again needing
to have a story,
the blessed absence of internal words.

©Wendy Mulhern
September 2, 2018

At Dawn

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Be not tormented —
you weren’t, after all,
any darker than the whole canvas,
any darker than the dark on dark
of stories about darkness
and rumors of a thing called light
sometimes dreamed, more felt than seen

And in that darkness,
no one prescription
is any better than any other,
however much prevailing topics
are wrongs of others, wrong on wrong

At dawn, it is revealed
none of these paths
are inaccessible to light,
none of those torments
have any staying power

They will lift
effortlessly as shadows,
we all will bask together in the sun.

©Wendy Mulhern
August 29, 2018

Elemental

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And if I am released
from the story of myself,
from its hopes and conflicts,
from its worries and pains

If I am willing, rather,
to find myself elemental —
swelling like magma behind the impulse,
comprised of the joy of the growing edge

Can I then cross over
into timelessness and wonder?
into selflessness and understanding,
into living as lens and mirror
to all that shines?

©Wendy Mulhern
August 22, 2018

Beyond the story

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There is a brand of helplessness
for every story. Let me not
be taken in

There is a way of winning
in every story. Let me not
be tempted

There is a way of breaking out
of every story. This is my hope —
to be unburdened from all former loops,
to be released

Beyond the story, where there is nothing
for me to win or lose or mindlessly repeat,
awaits the unity
or timelessness and opening dimensions.
Beyond the story
I am complete.

©Wendy Mulhern
August 3, 2018

The Costume Room

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In the costume room
there were many choices —
things to put on you, things to put on me,
faces, masks, and characters,
roles and stories

In the costume room, we know
all these things were put on
and thus could sense that also
we could take them off

Here in the mirror world
it’s not so clear
what I project on you,
what’s really there —
we could be completely different people
in each other’s plays,
not even knowing it
and thus surprised
by all the things we see each other do.
Has it ever seemed that way to you?

©Wendy Mulhern
February 11, 2018