Nobody’s taken a package home,
no one has grabbed it
to call their own,
nobody owns it and nobody lacks –
No
good
but
One
And there’s no measure for the infinite,
and there’s no soul in which it doesn’t fit –
the good we pull up in ourselves
flows without end –
this is true for all of us
and everything that lives.
©Wendy Mulhern
January 4, 2023
No need to postulate a puppeteer
pulling strings to move things to his will
You could as well consider
the element of goodness
present in every particle,
lifting each in its own buoyancy of joy,
none of them orchestrated,
none moved by some external will
But each in the imperative of essence
exercising that which goodness does,
joining and celebrating, lifting the collective
through being what it most desires to be.
©Wendy Mulhern
April 1, 2022
My life is full,
my life is whole,
and from this vantage point
I look back over years
and see that it was always so
My life belongs to goodness,
and only goodness can define
the elements comprising it,
its color, form, and line
If this is simple,
it’s also deep,
and intricate in its design –
this understanding is what I’ll keep
and be forever fine.
©Wendy Mulhern
March 17, 2022
Today I have been confident.
I have been willing
to trust entirely
in the unceasing arc of goodness
I have refused to give credence
to catspaws of fate
sending darting scenarios
across my thought
I have stayed here in the calm
where none of these things move me.
It has come clearer
that this perception
is not effaced by contradictions.
This perception
can take them all out.
©Wendy Mulhern
October 21, 2021
The goodness of life
can’t be extracted from the moment,
can’t be packaged as a supplement
to take later, or to take
without having noticed
the textures and tremolos,
the subtle but definite
order of everything,
without comprehending
the depth and constancy
of your belonging
and what it means
The goodness of life
requires you.
©Wendy Mulhern
September 16, 2021
These days it seems the best pleasures
are not the ones we plan,
but those that swoop upon us –
hot shower in the rain,
gust of cold air as I walk
back to the cabin, fire-warmed within,
small expressions of appreciation
for our work, each with our separate tasks,
mutual understanding,
the sweeping sense, at wee hours
of the night,
that all is well, that goodness reigns
and never lets us down.
©Wendy Mulhern
March 28, 2021
Teach me to wish for good things,
for there is plenty of power
in the framing of what is good,
in noticing
how eloquently each good thing
speaks for itself,
not needing to be defined
by absence, or by otherness,
not needing to be specified
as change from what has been
or what has been imagined
Each note of blackbird song,
each creaky goose call,
each evening frog chorus
shows the nature of good things –
finding their perfect tone
in the breath-held air.
©Wendy Mulhern
January 31, 2021
The good you are
is so much bigger
than the little checkered parcels
that you tried to earn,
the sit still in your seat
do what the teacher says
kind of good
The good you are
is so much bigger
than what you hoped you might achieve
or what you hoped
to be accepted for
Note this: the good you are
could never dim out towards the edge,
could never fail to fill
every niche and corner of your being
The good you are
has no nemesis, no cavity.
It is not part of you — it’s everything —
all of you — clear, whole, free.
©Wendy Mulhern
October 31, 2019
Today I offer you the only good that is,
the good that is One, the good that is All
Today I offer you
the good that has no terror in it,
no separation, no conditions —
the good that is right here,
not held at arm’s length
for you to leap for and be laughed at,
the good that you could never fail
to breathe in, to embody
Today I offer you
the good that has no dark side,
that spreads its loving touch
to every entity — that makes them melt
in love, in joy, in grateful strong surrender,
and no one is a horrible example,
for all are needed in the true design
Today I offer you
the good that changes history,
replacing blame, regret, remorse
with sweet returning green,
with fragrance and with flowering,
the growth circle of being.
©Wendy Mulhern
July 8, 2019
The fact of your goodness
is not in question. It is the frame of it,
the why, I seek to point out.
It is the size of it, the scope,
the way your light holds true and shining
against the backdrop of infinity
It never was defined
by what you’re not,
what you’ve abstained from,
or lucked out of,
it’s not from being on the winning side
Your goodness is pure
and so it can define
for you, and maybe others,
how uplifting and illuminating goodness is.
Through this goodness you can know your source —
it quenches thirst and nourishes, the same.
©Wendy Mulhern
May 3, 2019