M
ary’s thoughts flickered through her mind like the butterflies she loved. How was this to happen? When? How would she explain it to her mother? Her father? And Joseph? Sweet Joseph. But how would he — how could he! — react to news like this? She felt trapped between unspeakable ecstasy and terrible convolution.
A quiet girl, yet playful, quick to laugh. Content with simple things. The angelic visit vivid in her thoughts, she relived, she tasted each delicious word. She found herself repeating over and over “How can this be?” Despite the opacity of her comprehension, her heart had ceased its pounding. Her eyes lay softly upon the stars peeking through violet vespers hushed. She wondered what lived beyond the stars.
It was not abrupt, nor disruptively sudden, but it was instantaneous. Softly, tenderly, Mary felt warmth surround her as if her mother had just covered her with a blanket on a winter’s night. In her body, in her soul, her being — that eternal part of her, touched with Something beyond anything she had known or ever would know again. Jacob was once touched like this and became a cripple.
Mary became pregnant.
The Holy Spirit shall come upon you and the power of the Most High shall overshadow you . . .
Are there words that describe, that capture this juncture of God with human? Love? Elation? Rapture? Completion?
She knew only that she had been known.
