It was the light she remembered. Even now, in all this darkness that attends aging, it is the light she remembers. The light. It is without horizons and yet most of the time it seems just beyond the horizon, the invisible presence that though it is inside her, is just beyond the horizon she became when the Holy Spirit overshadowed her. It is her hope, this light, especially in the deepest night. The memory of it now as then, just after the angel’s light, the words like the static of lightning disappearing and light remaining like a gentle rain falling, the room as quiet as before, the silence returning as light.
The closeness of the dark night. The memory of yesterday’s dawn making the dark light, the light dark, all because of that other Light out of the invisible, the place of the angel’s arrival and departure.
— from the book Nourishing Love: A Franciscan Celebration of Mary
by Murray Bodo, OFM