Thoughts about the Annunciation (2)

Continuing discomfort about this - a sense that I really am wrongly imposing myself on the text.... we do need to recognise what Mary faced, what obedience would have looked like in practice, but then to allow the mystery to overwhelm us as it overwhelmed her.  And behold, the answer to my struggles was handed to me by Alan, who came home from Durham today with an essay to write on the portrayal of Christ in Christmas art or liturgy - and a handout of poems as part of the possible material.  Which included this..... new to me, and wonderfully saying just what I was seeking after.

Annunciation
by Denise Levertov

‘Hail, space for the uncontained God’
From the Agathistos Hymn,

Greece

, VIc


We know the scene: the room, variously furnished,
almost always a lectern, a book; always
the tall lily.
                   Arrived on solemn grandeur of great wings,
the angelic ambassador, standing or hovering,
whom she acknowledges, a guest.

But we are told of meek obedience. No one mentions
courage.
                  The engendering Spirit
did not enter her without consent.
                                    God waited.

She was free
to accept or to refuse, choice
integral to humanness.

          ____________________________

Aren’t there annunciations
of one sort or another
in most lives?
                   Some unwillingly
undertake great destinies,
enact them in sullen pride,
uncomprehending.
             More often
those moments
     when roads of light and storm
     open from darkness in a man or woman,
are turned away from
in dread, in a wave of weakness, in despair
and with relief.
Ordinary lives continue.
                              God does not smite them.
But the gates close, the pathway vanishes.

         ______________________________

She had been a child who played, ate, slept
like any other child – but unlike others,
wept only for pity, laughed
in joy not triumph.
Compassion and intelligence
fused in her, indivisible.

Called to a destiny more momentous
than any in all of Time,
she did not quail,
                       only asked
a simple, 'How can this be?'
and gravely, courteously,
took to heart the angel’s reply,
perceiving instantly
the astounding ministry she was offered:

to bear in her womb
Infinite weight and lightness; to carry
in hidden, finite inwardness,
nine months of Eternity; to contain
in slender vase of being,
the sum of power –
in narrow flesh,
the sum of light.
                   Then bring to birth,
push out into air, a Man-child
needing, like any other,
milk and love –

but who was God.

This was the minute no one speaks of,
when she could still refuse.

A breath unbreathed,
                       Spirit,
                                 suspended,
                                              waiting.
          ____________________________

She did not cry, "I cannot, I am not worthy,"
nor "I have not the strength."
She did not submit with gritted teeth,
                                          raging, coerced.
Bravest of all humans,
                              consent illumined her.
The room filled with its light,
the lily glowed in it,
                          and the iridescent wings.
Consent,
              courage unparalleled,
opened her utterly.

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