Hagiography
after Charles Sprague Pearce's Sante Genevieve
Believe half at most. I don’t
mean the miracles—take the impossible
at its word. But beware the gentle myths.
Men christen saints in retrospect,
bestow halos in hindsight.
Revision renders my youth pastoral,
unfettered, ruddy with adoration.
But farmers’ daughters were made
for another veil and vow, for a dress
stained with man’s seed, leaking his fruit.
A daughter’s cross: to bear and bear until
she can bear no more. The Lord’s commands
can damn a woman. Generations call me
blessed, but the world has other names
for girls who hear from God.
All divine whispers yield a curse.
Carry God’s child, and you are a whore.
Carry no one’s child, and you are no one.
Scribes cannot taste the stale sneer’s
venom, how it clouds holy dreams.
So my wildest truth remains
untold—that yearning plagued me
beyond words or womb, that when I shut
my eyes, the angel’s gaze held
and overshadowed everything.
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Wow, Whitney. Always amazed. Congrats!
I am amazed by this poem that speaks across the ages.