Breathe Deeply

 Third Friday of Advent


                                                                 ...I say that we are wound
                                                                 With mercy round and round
                                                                  As if with air: the same

Is Mary, more by name.                                                   
She, wild web, wondrous robe,
Mantles the guilty globe,
Since God has her dispense
Her prayers his providence:
Nay, more than almoner,
The sweet alms’ self is her
And men are meant to share
Her life as life does air.





 Excerpt from:   The Blessed Virgin compared
                              to the Air we Breathe
                                                         Gerard Manley Hopkins




We went to Mass this evening.  The prayer flames’ flickering within red and blue
votives from minuscule breezes of jarred heaven; raising intentions of our hearts
from so small a spark like night around embers of fire rings.  Oh, Holy Mary, God’s
masterpiece perfected, vessel of God bridging the two realms.  Our Mother too.
Our Mother too.  How I love being on my knees in awe. The gate to heaven opening
by the Lord’s presence, Mother Mary’s, and all the Saints.  What mystery we are
summoned into if we would only let fall away the resilient robes of resistance. Rejoice.
Rejoice.  Drop to your knees and rejoice.  Mary is with child who comes to set us free;
a child who will suffer incomprehensibly along with his Blessed Mother for love of us,
of all us sinners. Hailing beneath the fullness of grace; the revolutionary.

Breathe in,
breathe in
the grace
from bloody grace.

Breathe deeply,
breathe deeply,

the ineffable Emmanuel.