Change as child-bearing, birth as a kind
of shucking off: out of what began
as a Mosaic insult—such a loathing
of the common origin, even a virgin,
having given birth, needs purifying—
to carry fire as though it were a flower,
the terror and the loveliness entrusted
into naked hands, supposing God might have,
might actually need a mother: people have
at times found this a way of being happy.