God’s worst angel, smoking behind the servo

again. Could drop a lit redhead into a gas puddle

and watch the whole afternoon open up

like a white flower. Kaboom. Everyone

gets to go home early. It’s 2008;

he’s on the annunciation beat. Tough work—

who wants a kid in these conditions? Last year

a truck tore the roof off the station and no one

has bothered to fix it. Metal struts cut up

the sky, like a cross left standing in a blast zone.

Rain falls in people’s hair, their tanks. And yes,

the angel is in my hometown: red dirt, population

under six thousand, expensive petrol. I know

what you’re thinking—he’s here for me, this is

a confessional. He’s here for some girl I knew,

this is a bit of stolen valour. The angel rolls a sneaker

against the slope of blood-coloured earth

that leans down to the pumps. Actually, he’s here

to steal cheap pregnancy tests from the IGA.

No one believes him these days, when he tells them:

buy bibs. Or says the Holy Ghost will come

on you. That’s in the New International Version.

Honest! A girl threw coffee at him about it, last time.

So: tests. A pack of five, slipped right off the shelf.

Why the cheap ones? Well, optics are everything

and poverty’s a good look on God. Widow’s mite.

Bethlehem hay. $14.95 Clearblue™

rapid indicator. Could just lob one through a window

or leave one under a pillow—skip the whole

wet scene. Rain shrouds the grass, the heads

bent over pumps. The angel thinks shroud

and means burial clothes. What’s a swaddle if not

the infant of a winding cloth? What did he say to Mary

if not you are going to suffer and suffer and suffer.

You are going to bring a baby into a terrible world.

You are going to know the exact weight

of his corpse. What does he say to Mary if not

hey, do you want a cigarette? It might be your last,

for a little bit.

And yes, the angel sees me walking home

from school, huddled under the parcel of books

on my back. We have nothing for each other today—

my huge ambivalence for children, his dislike

of hymns and onionskin. Eighty kilos. That’s average

for a 33-year-old male. A little less if he hasn’t eaten

a few days. This year, my life feels thin

as a psalm. I have chosen what to carry. And yes,

the angel throws me the whole pack, anyway.