Annunciation (Denise Levertov)

  Hail, space for the uncontained God    

  From the Agathistos Hymn,  Greece, VI c.

   

  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 without her consent.  

God waited. 

  

She was free 

to accept or 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 ate, played, 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,

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 moment no one speaks of,

when she could stil refuse.

A breath unbreathed,

                                   Spirit,

                                               susupended,

                                                                      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.

Image source (1):  Fra Angelico, Annunciation (ca. 1426), Prado

Image source (2):  Annunciation Silk, 8th-9th c., Vatican Museum

Poem source