Annunciation, by Isabel Cristina Legarda

Mérode Altarpiece (a triptych by the workshop of Robert Campin (Belgium, b. France) c. 1427-32

Annunciation
 
The Workshop of Campin
painted it best – my absorption
in a shrouded book implicit requirement
that the angel’s message be worthy
of my time. A little spoiler alert
hovering just above the left wing.
 
In a different era
I would have been the girl
with a microscope in her room
ready to scrutinize a frost of cells
in order to comprehend the enormity
of what was being asked.
 
I would have filled notebooks
with my wrangling, tried to capture
the rushing sound, not quite wind, not quite wings,
voice recorder in hand, a ghosthunter,
so I could later play it back and play it back
to hear the words beneath the static.
 
Divinity gives us no waivers to sign.
It’s all or nothing, no meeting halfway.
So I would have insisted, and did,
on full disclosure. How, exactly. When.
What I should have asked
was why.

Isabel Cristina Legarda

Isabel Cristina Legarda was born in the Philippines and spent her early childhood there before moving to the U.S. She is currently a practicing physician in Boston. Her work has appeared or is forthcoming in Cleaver, America, Ruminate, The New York Quarterly, and others. She can be found on Instagram: @poetintheOR.