What next, she wonders,
with the angel disappearing, and her room
suddenly gone dark.
The loneliness of her news
possesses her. She ponders
how to tell her mother.
Still, the secret at her heart burns like
a sun rising. How to hold it in –
that which cannot be contained.
She nestles into herself, half-convinced
it was some kind of good dream,
she its visionary.
But then, part dazzled, part prescient –
she hugs her body, a pod with a seed
that will split her.
Luci Shaw
illustration: Annunciation, by Henry Ossawa Tanner, 1898
