Poetry: Annunciation

 Annunciation

I imagine when the writer says frightened

that she is speaking of this:

the cold night air, the openness of that sky,

like the drive home on Solstice night

when the heavens are suddenly brilliant

and orange 

and wide

wheels it seems

like seraphim

could fly into the sun.

It’s not the slaughter of innocents-

but the possibility of change-

that petrifies.

Shepherds know how to stave

off an attack-

a wolf or a thief. 

It’s what they’re there for. 

But 

the light that calls from the sky

that tells you to Go-

fieldwork in fields

charts and maps

behind-

this is the thing 

that turns keepers of flocks

to a monument of stones.