Not like Barocci’s kneeling pink-cheeked girl

(who’d be afraid of her?) with white lace wings

that gazes up at Mary with a smile…  

No, warrior Gabriel had frightened kings

and generals when he appeared:  “Fear not!”

had been his necessary words to all.

More likely it was Mary fell prostrate

as holy light threw shadows on the wall,

and words that she was blest and would give birth

without knowing a man clouded her mind.

To Joseph came the same confounding truth:

an angel in a dream said he would find

her pregnant without sex.  The angel’s word

from God caused them to accept the absurd.

– Steve Shoemaker, Urbana, IL, December 27, 2012