Inclusion is Wonderful

I've sent a lot of pieces to a lot of places.  I've been rejected time after time.  I even kept a binder of the kind rejection notes that I have gotten (with the appropriate pieces attached).  As my own inside joke, the binder is thin and embossed with the letters PMS, from an old computer system I once managed.   Do I need to say that I love irony?  

So, the last few weeks were made of pure joy for me.  Not one but two pieces got accepted.  First the Tallgrass Anthology took my short story about a haunted house in my neighborhood, called My Mount Greenwood Home.   

Then one of my poems, called Recipe, was accepted in the Revise the Psalm: Work Celebrating the Writing of Gwendolyn Brooks.  This work is about a woman who is brewing something up to revenge herself.   

Let me point out the irony in these selections.  Two different publications, but one strong theme.  I am busy dealing with death.  They do say,  write what you know.