I swam in what shone at me only able to endure it by being no one and so specifically myself I thought I’d die from being loved like that.
Annunciation, a poem by Marie Howe
“Poetry is a big part of everything that I do and teach and live. Annunciation by Marie Howe, a contemporary American poet from New York, is one of my favorite poems right now. It evokes Mary receiving the angel Gabriel who tells her she’s going to be a vessel for the love in the world. The last part of that poem says: “I swam in what shone at me, only able to endure it by being no one and so specifically myself I thought I’d die from being loved like that.” For me the power of that whole poem is that the way of the feminine is both about transcendence and embodiment. It’s about dissolving the illusion of the separate self into the boundless field of love. It’s also about celebrating particularity and the pouring of the sacred into the particular of the formless, taking form through us.”
Mirabai Starr is the author of Wild Mercy:
Living the Fierce and Tender Wisdom
of the Women Mystics
