Rap these old dichotomies
with the question of your knuckle–
You'll hear they don't ring true.
There's Mary, virgin mother,
passing through children to childlessness
on the road to Bethelehem
veering off to Calvary.
She's clung
and flung
the very same son
the very same son
both loved
and left her.
She's crossed lines
and studied their intersection
+
two dimensions at odds
even on a single plane.
Mary–
the spouse her husband
would not have married
Mary–
the mother crazed
by the madness of her son
Mary–
the lily snake-charmer
and apocalyptic general
marching down these springtime
days of May,
drafting every able body
into the revolution
that one silent night
opened up her womb.