I’d like us to take a walk together.

Let’s go over to the park and watch the ducks in the water. Let’s visit that museum and learn a bit about the war—we could walk over to the next town. Let’s walk on and on, until we break a world record for all of our walking.

But first I’d like you to meet me somewhere. It doesn’t have to be today, now, but one day.

You’ll have to do a little bit of walking yourself to meet me, and I can’t make that walk with you; somebody else must take up that role. Customarily this a man, but they are your steps to take, my love, you can choose anyone you wish. And I’ll be right there, waiting. In fact, if you look up, you’ll see me just at the end of the path.

Before we start this walk, would you say a few words? I’ll say one or two myself. Then we may have to take some pictures, and stop to speak to a few people—they won’t be strangers, they’ll be the people who love us most in all the world.

Then we can take that walk, you and I. We’ll do some sightseeing, perhaps take a swim. If you hold on to my hand, I’ll never let go of yours. Even when you don’t want to walk through that field where the grass grows too high, or you’re frightened of walking when the sun has long set; my hand will remain in yours, my feet keeping step.

But on this day, when you’ll meet me somewhere, I must warn you that there is a long-held expectation on how you’re to look. Because though we embark on a long walk that day, you may choose to wear a dress.

I think tradition dictates it to be white.

And at some point, on that day, you’ll be asked to answer a few questions. Only they’re all asking the same thing—if you’ll promise to take my hand, and walk with me always. And if you do, promise to take that walk with me, you’ll only need to give one answer to all those questions. It’s quite simple.

I do.

Wedding bells in Thebes
Jewelled treasure about slim throats
Strife passed down bloodlines

~

a woman, weeping,
at her own wedding dinner,
copiously, bleating sobs,
unsignaled, unprovoked, inexplicable.

misunderstanding guests,
shifting their weight
from foot to foot,
searching for a combo-pose of
of joyous discomfort.

all is well, say the wedding singers,
hymns of wedding songs they perform,
encouraging the standers-about
to dance,
all whom are inconsolably confused about
the wed woman's recognition of a
moment's milestone marker
which distinguishes, her totality,
feeling the differential between
the miles ahead,
the miles already passed,
but cannot answer
the singular considerable consideration question,
is this mine, the right road
and am I
who I am supposed to be,
or the supposition of others

which is why bride weeps at her wedding

~

a sober, industrious, quiet man
of many middle years,
seen sway dancing on the lawn
at 6:00 AM,
to sounds unheard,
was it music, voices,
a breaking point,
the birth of madness?

we, who watched from within,
behind a safe boundary
of glass and stucco and timber,
jealously considering alternate theories
of creation of the universe,
dual roles,
observing guests and voyeurs,
prayed for ourselves,
desirous of his wishes granted,
swayed with him,
in flagrante delicto,
co-conspirators unseen,
but jailed,
behind protective walls of
glass and stucco and timber,
sotto voce confessing priest-worthy sins
while protesting their innocent knowledge
of a man's delightful craziness,
a distraction from
weeping brides

~

the parents posts to Facebook
pictures of children,
warily unaware that their favoritism
is slip showing

oh they favor the youngest son,
beautiful Joseph with many colored coats,
possessing the practiced cuteness
and skillfully employ how to manipulate it sweetly
on suspecting adults

the  eldest daughter,
unconsciously,
is the child made over
into a physical representation,
a manifestation of themselves preserved
as parents are wont to do
just because
they can
~
the swayer wedding guest
pray~dances to the tune of:

give over, her to me, to me,
to replant her unsuspecting
in garden wild,
feed her colors of her as yet unthought of,
foresee her aching beauty,
teach her freedom dancing by the sea,
weeping at her weeping
at her wedding
simpatico with her,
confusion and joy and fear

which is why the man sway dances
on the lawn at 6:00 am and weeps
copious bereft and joyous,
at the possibilities of conquering life
and foresees
the child wedding weeping
and weeps in anticipatory empathy sympathy
at their cojoined
kinship fate

~