Hail, Mary!

The new poetry feature is up at Escape Into Life! It's the fabulous Mary Biddinger, with cool collage art by Tony Fitzpatrick, sometimes in oddly Christmasy colors, like this red and green fish!

And I've been reflecting on the Virgin Mary, thanks to this 3rd Sunday of Advent reflection by Susan Ryder over at the Reflecting Pool. It provoked quite a discussion, I hear, not exactly in response to the questions at the end or the continuing theme of "Fear not."

My mom and I missed church for that train trip to Chicago to hear readings from Solace in So Many Words at Woman Made Gallery. So we were reflecting on important things, but we were not discussing Mary's virginity (or lack thereof) or the virtues of fine storytelling as part of most religions.

Actually, I was discussing religion and mythology in my Solace essay, so I guess this is a Random Coinciday in the blog, too.

To that end, I would just like to say that it was not quite coincidence that I picked this art for Mary's poems. That is, I chose this coincidence of hairstyle. See the straight-across bangs on the girl in this collage? Just like Mary Biddinger's! Although that's a bit hidden under her green winter hat in the EIL bio photo. Just like "hidden" meanings in poems (or lack thereof).

Hail, Mary, full of grace.