Look – look at our world,
and tell me, what’s not possible?
Can it really be possible
for us to wallow
in casual cruelty? Unwittingly
acquiesce to unmitigated horror?
Is it possible we would allow ourselves
to randomly give up our power
to those who use it
for the demise of all?
Look at the dawn, look at the field
when the fog lifts, and the sun
greets golden leaves of autumn trees.
Look at our hearts, and recognize
what’s possible.
©Wendy Mulhern
November 10, 2023
Take away a layer,
a layer, a layer
Move through a veil,
a veil, a veil
And what you find is more,
not less. In leaving husks behind,
you find the juice, the pulse,
the flavor,
the quickening, the rush,
the reason
It’s not a sacrifice
to give up what hides,
what dulls –
to take up life
in the full flow of desire,
to drink the pure purpose
No need to wait
for false views to erode,
when you can just go in
and find the truth.
©Wendy Mulhern
November 8, 2023
The trees are faithful,
the trees and water,
the trees and water and the moving air,
and the embracing sky
So when I wander into fiction,
another’s or my own concoction,
their steadfastness in what they are
will guide me back to truth.
©Wendy Mulhern
October 17, 2023
Truth, coming into view
takes on the contexts
that it shines through –
colors, textures, rhythm, song –
and those perceiving it
are always moved
Truth, in another context,
moves in anew –
its lines are different,
as is its form, and yet,
those who receive it
know it, too
And though there be a disconnect
in color, shape, and sound,
we know the quality of truth
is still the same,
by how it deepens us,
uncovering our feet,
how it teaches us
to leap free.
©Wendy Mulhern
September 14, 2023
Well, if I don’t tell myself the truth,
who will? And yet this truth
is not the stuff of petty disappointments,
layers of them, self-hidden by my self-image,
the sense I should know better
than to feel this way.
No. This truth must embrace
stepping outside the borders of myself
to look around. Losing sight, thereby,
of any self-sense. Picking up, instead,
kind eyes, eagerly receiving
all of these most interesting beings,
offering acceptance, and coming back around
to be accepted,
in the easy way where none of us is judge.
©Wendy Mulhern
August 11, 2023
The words are all here,
the ones that make clear
what we are, what we see,
what we know
The truth is right here,
it ever leads us
to drop assumptions,
see things new
I paint the word, the truth,
on what I see –
the land becomes my illustration –
its wide upsweep, the trees atop it –
I rest my eyes here
and feel at peace.
©Wendy Mulhern
August 2, 2023
Streaks of light
and the fact of innocence
shine clear when all the lies are gone
And people find it’s not too late
for trading in their hard bought worldly views,
the savvy of the turning cogs of wickedness,
and rolling with them to come out on top
Far better the transparency
of simple justice, seeing the worth
of every living being,
the recognition
of how we’re blessed by each of us,
the loss to all of throwing anyone away
It isn’t a hard sell, for everyone
has longed for this. Each one who takes a stand
helps bring it forth –
the innocence defining each of us,
truth that’s been waiting for us all along.
©Wendy Mulhern
June 8, 2023
The pretensions don’t matter.
All of us may show them –
the defensive or proud propping up
of what we think we should be,
the hapless implications of these constructs
on what we think of others
what we think of ourselves
We don’t need to deal in these things,
don’t need to buy and sell, compare,
determine, tally –
these things do not pertain to us at all –
one glimpse of truth,
and it doesn’t matter
what any of us have been propping up –
we fall like kindling flames
upon the truth of our pure selves
We light up the place,
we warm to what we’ve always longed to share –
nothing we thought we were
has anything to do with it –
we burn, and are reborn.
©Wendy Mulhern
June 3, 2023
Little laughs begin to form
like bubbles deep within –
they find their dazzling ascent
through the medium,
they lighten it throughout –
so many of them rising all at once –
and when they surface
they may only look like a smile,
but I think it will be one
that will make you feel good,
I think this is one you will like.
©Wendy Mulhern
May 12, 2023
The color is yellow
with red at the center,
the sound is clear water
in echoing caves,
the feeling is peace, the feeling is strength,
the taste
is thirst quench
and promise
This is a truth I grasped in a moment,
something discovered within,
challenge and touchstone
to use for my practice,
place to return to begin.
©Wendy Mulhern
April 18, 2023