Thou are an elect lady, whom I have called. 
D&C 25:3

This is Emma Hale at nineteen—
before she became Emma Smith.

Before the gold plates.
Before she lost her firstborn.
Before the selection of hymns.
Before the exile from Nauvoo.
Before the loneliness of polygamy.
Before the martyrdom at Carthage.
Before history reached for her name.

She is simply Emma—
inhabiting a quiet life
she might have thought unending.

Her gaze is direct,
but not yet prophetic.
Her dress is plain.
The background, dark—
not ominous,
but untouched.
A world not yet stirred by revelation.

This is the sacredness
of ordinary time,
of foreordination,
before awareness.
A young woman
with her own thoughts.
Her own dreams.
Her own unstoried future.

We rarely allow history to linger here—
in the hush before calling,
in the hours before discipleship,
in the space not yet defined
by a man-prophet, a cause,
or a crown of sorrow and glory.

But every sacred history
has a beginning.

And every elect lady
was once simply a girl—
standing still
at the threshold of destiny.