The Annunciation
This poem by Fr Killian McDonnell, OSB is a very interesting take on The Annunciation. A priest gave me a card a number of years ago, following a retreat I had directed, and this was on the card. I liked it then, and since.
IN THE KITCHEN
Bellini has it wrong.
I was not kneeling
quietly at prayer,
head slightly bent
to show submission.
Painters always
get it wrong, skewed,
as though my life
were wrapped in the silks,
in temple smells.
Actually I had just
come back from the well,
pitcher in my hand.
As I placed it on the table
I spilled some on the floor.
Bending to wipe
it up, there was a light,
against the kitchen wall
as though someone had opened
the door to the sun.
Rag in hand,
hair across my face,
I turned to see
who was coming in,
unannounced, unasked.
All I saw
was light, whiter
than whitest white.
I hear a voice
I had never heard,
walking toward me,
saying I was chosen,
The Favoured One.
I pushed back my hair,
stood baffled.
With the clarity of light
the light spoke
of Spirit, shadow, child
as the water puddled
large around my feet.
Against all reason,
against all rationality,
I knew it would be true.
I heard my voice
“I have no man.”
The Lord is God
of all possibilities:
with Elizabeth no flow
of blood in thirty years
but six months gone.
From the fifteen years
of my Nazareth wisdom
I spoke to the light
in the joy of truth:
“Let it be so.”
Someone closed the door.
And I dropped the rag.
