Robin Mullery

The idea behind Bright Existence was to give the community a sense of wonder and delight as we emerged from the isolation and hardships of the pandemic. To see the physical environment affected as we humans have been affected through mourning and living, loss and becoming, change and having changed. 

The title of the piece is from Brenda Hillman’s poem and book, Bright Existence.

Bright Existence

In spring, the great pines waited a little faster.
Wildflowers turned
on their big circles, under the earth 

and the orchid, which always came back
to the same slanty light
in the forest floor
pushed toward the edges of itself. 

Lovers, are you there? Why were you one body
in that moist boat. The flower
could touch you everywhere like a party,
that series of bright confetti
in its throat— 

Joy! What is it. Where does it come from;
where does it go? Sunlight
seized the flat leaves; 

there should be more witnesses at the edges of the self
where everything is both. 

The oak moths,
holding pale tomorrows,
dropped on invisible threads before the flower, 

the part that wasn’t ready
stayed inside a little longer
and the part that was ready to be something
came forth--

Hillman, Brenda. “Bright Existence” from Bright Existence © 1993
by Brenda Hillman. Published by Wesleyan University Press and
reprinted with permission.