Through the starred Judean night
She went, in travail of the Light,
With the earliest hush she saw
God beside her in the straw.
One poor taper glimmered clear,
Drowsing Joseph nodded near,
All the glooms were rosed with wings.
She that knew the Spirit's kiss
Wearied of the bright abyss.
Baby kids that butted hard
In the shadowy stable yard;
Silken doves that dipped and preened
Where the crumbling well-curb greened;
Sparrows in the vine, and small
Sapphired flies upon the wall,
So lovely they seemed musical.
In the roof a swift had built.
All the new-born airs were spilt
Out of cups the morning made
Of a glory and a shade.
These her solemn eyelids felt
While unseen the seraphs knelt.
Then a young mouse, sleek and bold,
Rustling in the winnowed gold,
To her shadow crept, and curled
Near the Ransom of the world.
Marjorie Pickthall's "Mary Tired" is most remarkable for its subject matter. Pickthall wrote the first known Canadian poem to depict a women who had just given birth. The woman (who is, of course, the Virgin Mary), is surveying her surroundings and basking in the glory of this miraculous event. While Mary's essential role in the birth of Jesus suggests that all women are divine by association, Pickthall is careful to depict Mary as a human being. Although she is thankful for her distinction, the exhausting ordeal of labour now makes her temporarily "tired of heavenly things"(10). Pickthall reinforces Mary's human qualities by surrounding her with mundane scenes of stable-life; the animals continue their playful activities, completely oblivious to the divine miracle that just occurred.