The present paper explores how a systems approach to patterns and pattern language could support systemic inquiry and systemic design, and more broadly, the advancement of pattern language. It examines the multiple facets and definitions of the concept of pattern and proposes reconciling them to include the affordances that patterns bring both to inquiry and design within a larger systems framework. In particular, it discusses extending the act of design to encompass the inquiry that motivates a design and the ongoing monitoring of the fitness of this design to its intended purpose in a systems perspective. Considering complexity and the notion of generativity, this approach challenges the appropriateness of patterns expressed in problem-solution form and suggests ways forward for extended definitions and pattern forms. This work contributes to bringing pattern thinking and systems thinking, or pattern science and systems science, closer to each other. The purpose is to further integrate pattern thinking and pattern language in the design, assessment, and orientation of our socio-technological and socio-environmental systems, both large and small, to better address the societal challenges of our time. It complements various initiatives aimed at harnessing pattern languages for sustainability and societal change and at developing pattern literacy in support of systems literacy.