I fall asleep in a room high above the sea.
That night a storm blows in, with heavy rains,
lashing the house again and again.
Once the wind slams so hard the bed jumps.

This really happens: the frame shudders, then stills.

Sitting in my office talking with a student
I suddenly feel dizzy. It’s as if the building is swaying.
But then I realize, the building is swaying,
it’s rocking, and the light hanging from the ceiling
is swinging back and forth, and it’s as if
a wave of energy is rippling through the floor—no, is.

Sometimes it is not we who move.
Sometimes the angel really is an angel, not an allegory,
not a discourse, but with huge, dark wings,
heavy as suitcases, and my advice when an angel speaks
is to be very quiet. Hold very still.

If you sit long enough by a window,
early on a winter morning, you can see the moon
set into the dark trees, you can see it sink, very slowly,
every minute or so a little further, until finally
it disappears entirely, glowing in the tops of the fir.

Notice how the feathers overlap like herringbone.
Notice that Mary isn’t holding a book.