Playing Mother (Poetry)

Did the angel tell her all the Ts & Cs
advise she’d learn the ropes from day to day
and did she feel a prickle of unease
or query anything he had to say?

Did she make application for the job?
If so, there is no copy found on file
Who picked her out — her face among the mob
of other virgins sweet and free from guile?

No warning then, no chance to turn it down
explain she nursed ambitions other than
embrace a spotless rôle of such renown
give birth to spirit in the guise of man

She shouldered well those duties — didn’t shirk
despite the hours stretched beyond her life
true nature shown in her maternal work
her image venerated — maid and wife

But was she happy — did that angel warn
specifically of agony to come
that she would feel the stab of spear and thorn
and witness how they tortured Him — her son?

Remuneration came in blood and tears
her pension from the Company of God
perhaps she sometimes wandered down the years
another path — the road she might have trod ...