Laughter

Laughter

Bryan Halferty

When He said, you will be with child,
what other response was there
but laughter, fluttering out
like a dying bird.

I—like you Sarai,
have eyed the clay bottom
of my cup,
as some would a telescope
spying the approach
of the impossible:
A baby born
through barren loins
to multiply like anxious
cells.

Laughter,
muffled, or plump as an apple,
I have spilled that answer
also into the absurdity of promise
but then watched
during desert nights,
how a thousand
broken seeds uncurl
themselves and arise
in the fathoms of midnight—
bright green singing, laughing things
growing past the earth, into the desert air
into a nation of branches.

---

Bryan Halferty
Poet & Pastor

Bryan has been published in The Anglican Theological Review, The Penwood Review, and more recently on Mockingbird. He is, additionally, the Lead Pastor of Anchor Church. You can read more of his work here.

Photography by Arun Clarke