Readings are listed in alphabetical order by author\u2019s last name.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
Why I chose these readings:<\/em> I searched for readings that might appeal to Unitarian Universalist couples, though non-religious people may also find them suitable. Since I’m a feminist, I looked for readings that didn’t perpetuate sexist stereotypes about marriage. I tried to include readings that could be used regardless of the gender(s) of a wedding couple, the couple’s ages, etc. I wanted to include readings that would represent Unitarian Universalist values of equity and equality (so there are even one or two readings which might sound political, e.g. the excerpt from the Goodridge and Obergfell court decisions). Most importantly, I looked for readings that express the Unitarian Universalist understanding of marriage as a covenant, that is, a set of lifelong promises that a wedding couple make to one another.<\/p>\n\n\n\n Copyright:<\/em> To the best of my knowledge, all the material included here is either in the public domain, or is included as a fair use of copyrighted material (under 500 words, and less than half of a complete poem). For copyrighted material, I provide links to websites which have permission to post the material. If you are a copyright holder and want your material taken down, please email me.<\/p>\n\n\n\n Please don’t use pirated readings:<\/em> Most wedding websites include pirated poems and readings, that is, readings posted to the web without permission from the authors. It’s bad luck to use pirated material in your wedding ceremony! Besides, it’s super easy to go buy a collection of wedding readings published by a reputable publisher where permissions have been obtained from the authors. For Unitarian Universalists, I recommend We Pledge Our Hearts, ed. Edward <\/a>S<\/a>earl<\/a> (Boston: Skinner House, 2006). If I’m officiating at your wedding, I can lend you a copy of this book.<\/p>\n\n\n\n Author backgrounds:<\/em> Authors represent a variety of ethnicities and religious backgrounds, from several different centuries. Unitarian Universalist, or UU, authors are noted by [UU] after their names.<\/p>\n\n\n\n Updated 28 Sept. 2023. 52 readings and links to readings; 3 references to print sources for readings which are not available legally online.<\/p>\n\n\n\n by Maya Angelou<\/p>\n\n\n\n “Then you rose into my life \/ Like a promised sunrise….”<\/p>\n\n\n\n This reading is typically posted online without<\/em> permission from the copyright holder. It’s illegal to post the entire poem online without permission! And it’s bad luck to use pirated material in your wedding ceremony! However, this poem is easily available in Maya Angelou’s book And Still I Rise<\/em> (New York: Random House and Virago Press, 1978) \u2014 you should be able to borrow it from your local public library.<\/p>\n\n\n\n by Margaret Atwood<\/p>\n\n\n\n “Marriage is not \/ a house or even a tent \/ it is before that….”<\/p>\n\n\n\n Link to poem<\/a><\/p>\n\n\n\n by Anne Bradstreet<\/p>\n\n\n\n If ever two were one, then surely we. by Charlotte Bronte<\/p>\n\n\n\n I have for the first time found what I can truly love \u2014 I have found you.<\/em> You are my sympathy \u2014 my better self \u2014 my good angel \u2014 I am bound to you with a strong attachment. I think you good, gifted, lovely: a fervent, a solemn passion is conceived in my heart; it leans to you, draws you to my center and spring of life, wraps my existence about you \u2014 and, kindling in pure, powerful flame, fuses you and me into one.<\/p>\n\n\n\n by Gwendolyn Brooks<\/p>\n\n\n\n Quite simply, one of the best short American poems about a long-term marriage.<\/p>\n\n\n\n Link to the poem<\/a><\/p>\n\n\n\n by Elizabeth Barrett Browning<\/p>\n\n\n\n How do I love thee? Let me count the ways. by Robert Burns<\/p>\n\n\n\n O my Luve is like a red, red rose So fair art thou, my bonnie lass, Till a\u2019 the seas gang dry, my dear, And fare thee weel, my only luve! by Chen Chen<\/p>\n\n\n\n “i love you to the moon & \/ not back , let’s not come back, let’s go by the speed of \/ queer zest….” I think the first 16 lines of the poem work best for a wedding reading.<\/p>\n\n\n\n Link to the poem<\/a><\/p>\n\n\n\n by Lucille Clifton<\/p>\n\n\n\n “and may you in your innocence \/ sail through this to that”<\/p>\n\n\n\n Link to the poem<\/a><\/p>\n\n\n\n from the New Revised Standard Version<\/p>\n\n\n\n If I speak in the tongues of mortals and of angels, but do not have love, I am a noisy gong or a clanging cymbal. And if I have prophetic powers, and understand all mysteries and all knowledge, and if I have all faith, so as to remove mountains, but do not have love, I am nothing. If I give away all my possessions, and if I hand over my body so that I may boast, but do not have love, I gain nothing.<\/p>\n\n\n\n Love is patient; love is kind; love is not envious or boastful or arrogant or rude. It does not insist on its own way; it is not irritable or resentful; it does not rejoice in wrongdoing, but rejoices in the truth. It bears all things, believes all things, hopes all things, endures all things.<\/p>\n\n\n\n Love never ends. But as for prophecies, they will come to an end; as for tongues, they will cease; as for knowledge, it will come to an end.\u00a0For we know only in part, and we prophesy only in part;\u00a0but when the complete comes, the partial will come to an end.\u00a0When I was a child, I spoke like a child, I thought like a child, I reasoned like a child; when I became an adult, I put an end to childish ways.\u00a0For now we see in a mirror, dimly, but then we will see face to face. Now I know only in part; then I will know fully, even as I have been fully known.\u00a0And now faith, hope, and love abide, these three; and the greatest of these is love.<\/p>\n\n\n\n by Countee Cullen<\/p>\n\n\n\n Come, let us plant our love as farmers plant by E. E. Cummings [UU]<\/p>\n\n\n\n “it is most mad and moonly”<\/p>\n\n\n\n Link to the poem<\/a><\/p>\n\n\n\n by A. Powell Davies [UU]<\/p>\n\n\n\n Link to the reading<\/a><\/p>\n\n\n\n by Emily Dickinson<\/p>\n\n\n\n I gave myself to Him \u2014 The Wealth might disappoint \u2014 Depreciate the Vision \u2014 At least \u2014 ’tis Mutual \u2014 Risk \u2014 by John Donne<\/p>\n\n\n\n I wonder, by my troth, what thou and I And now good-morrow to our waking souls, My face in thine eye, thine in mine appears, by Paul Laurence Dunbar<\/p>\n\n\n\n Come when the nights are bright with stars You are sweet, O Love, dear Love, Come when my heart is full of grief by Paul Laurence Dunbar<\/p>\n\n\n\n Love me. I care not what the circling years by George Eliot<\/p>\n\n\n\n What greater thing is there for two human souls, than to feel that they are joined for life \u2014 to strengthen each other in all labour, to rest on each other in all sorrow, to minister to each other in all pain, to be one with each other in silent unspeakable memories at the moment of the last parting?<\/p>\n\n\n\n From Adam Bede<\/em> (1859)<\/p>\n\n\n\n by Ralph Waldo Emerson [UU]<\/p>\n\n\n\n Give all to love; \u2019Tis a brave master; It was never for the mean; by Robert Fulghum [UU]<\/p>\n\n\n\n The symbolic vows you are about to make are a way of saying to one another, “You know all those things we’ve promised and hoped and dreamed — well, I meant it all, every word.”…<\/p>\n\n\n\n Look at one another \u2014 remember this moment in time. <\/p>\n\n\n\n Before this moment you have been many things to one another \u2014 acquaintance, friend, companion, lover, dancing partner, and even teacher, for you have learned much from one another…. Now you shall say a few words that shall take you across a threshold of life, and things will never be quite the same between you. For after these vows, you shall say to the world, This \u2014 is my [spouse].<\/p>\n\n\n\n from “Union,” in The Rituals of Our Lives<\/em> (Random House, 1996), p. 124. This essay gives the words of an actual wedding at which Fulghum officiated.<\/p>\n\n\n\n by William Channing Gannet [UU] <\/p>\n\n\n\n \u2026The love of twos begins in miracle, and the miracle never wholly dies away even when the days of Golden Wedding near. A mystery like that of birth and that of death is the mystery of two young spirits all unconsciously through distant ways approaching, each fated at some turn, some instant, to find and recognize the other. Follows, then, the second and continuing mystery of the two becoming very one\u2026.”<\/p>\n\n\n\n from The House Beautiful,<\/em> pp. 49-50<\/p>\n\n\n\n William Channing Gannet [UU]<\/p>\n\n\n\n And still one thing remains to furnish the House Beautiful \u2014 the most important thing of all, without which guests and books and flowers and pictures and harmonies of color only emphasize the fact that the house is not a home. I mean the warm light in the rooms that comes from kind eyes, from quick unconscious smiles, from gentleness in tones, from little unpremeditated caresses of manner, from habits of fore-thoughtfulness for one another, all that happy illumination which, on the inside of a house, corresponds to morning sunlight outside falling on quiet dewy fields. <\/p>\n\n\n\n It is an atmosphere really generated of many self-controls, of much forbearance, of training in self-sacrifice; but by the time it reaches instinctive expression these stern generators of it are hidden in the radiance resulting. It is like a constant love-song without words, whose meaning is, “We are glad that we are alive together.” It is a low pervading music, felt, not heard, which begins each day with the Good-morning, and only ends in the dream-drowse beyond Good-night. It is cheer; it is peace; it is trust; it is delight; it is all these for, and all these in, each other. <\/p>\n\n\n\n It knows no moods this warm love-light, \u2014 but is an even cheer, an even trust. The little festivals of love are kept, but, after all, the best days are the every-days because they are the every-days of love. The variant dispositions in the members of the home, the elements of personality to be “allowed for,” add stimulus and exhilaration to this atmosphere. Shared memories make part of it, shared hopes and fears, shared sorrows; shared self-denials make a very dear part of it.<\/p>\n\n\n\n from The House Beautiful,<\/em> pp. 44-46. In Gannet’s original version, this was one long paragraph; I’ve split it up into shorter paragraphs.<\/p>\n\n\n\n by Kahlil Gibran<\/p>\n\n\n\n Then Almitra spoke again and said, And what of Marriage, master? Love one another, but make not a bond of love: Give your hearts, but not into each other\u2019s keeping. from The Prophet<\/em> (New York: Knopf, 1923). <\/p>\n\n\n\n by Kahlil Gibran<\/p>\n\n\n\n When you love you should not say, \u201cGod is in my heart,\u201d but rather, \u201cI am in the heart of God.\u201d Love has no other desire but to fulfil itself. from The Prophet<\/em> (New York: Knopf, 1923). <\/p>\n\n\n\n by Richard Gilbert [UU]<\/p>\n\n\n\n “…cosmic bits of mass and energy \/ come to life together…”<\/p>\n\n\n\n from In the Holy Quiet: Meditations<\/a><\/p>\n\n\n\n by Dana McLean Greeley [UU]<\/p>\n\n\n\n Let all the beauty we have known Life’s music and its poetry Two stanzas from a five-stanza poem in his Forward Through the Ages<\/em> (First Parish in Concord, Mass., 1986), p. 148.<\/p>\n\n\n\n by Thich Nhat Hanh<\/p>\n\n\n\n An essay on marriage by Buddhist monk Thich Nhat Hanh, taken from his introduction to Love\u2019s Garden: A Guide to Mindful Relationships<\/em> by Peggy Rowe Ward and Larry Ward (Parallax Press, 2008). There are several passages in this lengthy introduction that might make good readings for a wedding \u2014 for example this one:<\/p>\n\n\n\n “When we marry or commit to another person, we make a promise to grow together, sharing the fruit and progress of practice. It is our responsibility to take care of each other. Every time the other person does something in the direction of change and growth, we should show our appreciation. <\/p>\n\n\n\n “If you have been together with your partner for some years, you may have the impression that you know everything about this person, but it\u2019s not so. Scientists can study a speck of dust for years, and they still don\u2019t claim to understand everything about it. If a speck of dust is that complex, how can you know everything about another person? Your partner needs your attention and your watering of his or her positive seeds. Without that attention, your relationship will wither.”<\/p>\n\n\n\n There are other passages that could also serve as wedding readings. Read the entire essay and see for yourself.<\/a><\/p>\n\n\n\n by Thich Nhat Hanh<\/p>\n\n\n\n “…Therefore you know \/ that as long as you continue to breathe, \/ I continue to be in you.”<\/p>\n\n\n\n Link the poem<\/a> \u2014 scroll down to the third poem<\/p>\n\n\n\n by Robert Herrick<\/p>\n\n\n\n How Love came in, I do not know, by Langston Hughes<\/p>\n\n\n\n I love to see the big white moon, I love the rain drops falling I love the deepness of the blue, by Charles Jefferys<\/p>\n\n\n\n We have lived and loved together Like the leaves that fall around us, We have lived and loved together Words above as printed in the Franklin Square Song Collection,<\/em> No. 2 (New York: Harper and Brothers, 1884), p. 36. This is the earliest version of this poem that I’ve been able to find.<\/p>\n\n\n\n by James Weldon Johnson<\/p>\n\n\n\n I dreamed that I was a rose I dreamed that you were a bee by Ben Jonson<\/p>\n\n\n\n Drink to me only with thine eyes, I sent thee late a rosy wreath, by June Jordan<\/p>\n\n\n\n “How do we come to be here next to each other….”<\/p>\n\n\n\n Link to the poem<\/a><\/p>\n\n\n\n by Edward Lear<\/p>\n\n\n\n Pussy said to the Owl, “You elegant fowl! “Dear Pig, are you willing to sell for one shilling by Joseph O. Legaspi<\/p>\n\n\n\n \u2026”I’m done with silence\u2026 \/ Truly we are enraptured \/ With Whitmanesque urge and urgency\u2026.”<\/p>\n\n\n\n Link to the poem<\/a><\/p>\n\n\n\n by Anne Morrow Lindbergh, pp. 100-101<\/p>\n\n\n\n The “veritable life” of our emotions and our relationships is \u2026 intermittent. When you love someone you do not love them all the time, in exactly the same way, from moment to moment. It is an impossibility. It is even a lie to pretend to. And yet this is exactly what most of us demand. We have so little faith in the ebb and flow of life, of love, of relationships. We leap at the flow of the tide and resist in terror its ebb. We are afraid it will never return. We insist on permanency, on duration, on continuity, when the only continuity possible, in life as in love, is in growth, in fluidity \u2014 in freedom, in the sense that the dancers are free, barely touching as they pass, but partners in the same pattern. The only real security is not in owning or possessing, not in demanding or expecting, not in hoping, even. Security in a relationship lies neither in looking back to what it was in nostalgia, nor forward to what it might be in dread or anticipation, but living in the present relationship and accepting it as it is now.<\/p>\n\n\n\n Justice Anthony Kennedy for the Supreme Court of the United States, Obergfell et al. v. Hodges, Director, Ohio Department of Health, et al., 576 U.S. 644 (2015)<\/p>\n\n\n\n From their beginning to their most recent page, the annals of human history reveal the transcendent importance of marriage. The lifelong union of a man and a woman always has promised nobility and dignity to all persons, without regard to their station in life. Marriage is sacred to those who live by their religions and offers unique fulfillment to those who find meaning in the secular realm. Its dynamic allows two people to find a life that could not be found alone, for a marriage becomes greater than just the two persons. Rising from the most basic human needs, marriage is essential to our most profound hopes and aspirations\u2026.<\/p>\n\n\n\n No union is more profound than marriage, for it embodies the highest ideals of love, fidelity, devotion, sacrifice, and family. In forming a marital union, two people become something greater than once they were.<\/p>\n\n\n\n Chief Justice Margaret H. Marshall for the Massachusetts Supreme Judicial Court, Hillary Goodridge & others v. Department of Public Health & another, 440 Mass. 309<\/p>\n\n\n\n Marriage is a vital social institution. The exclusive commitment of two individuals to each other nurtures love and mutual support; it brings stability to our society. For those who choose to marry, and for their children, marriage provides an abundance of legal, financial, and social benefits. In return it imposes weighty legal, financial, and social obligations. The question before us is whether, consistent with the Massachusetts Constitution, the Commonwealth may deny the protections, benefits, and obligations conferred by civil marriage to two individuals of the same sex who wish to marry. We conclude that it may not. The Massachusetts Constitution affirms the dignity and equality of all individuals. It forbids the creation of second class citizens. In reaching our conclusion we have given full deference to the arguments made by the Commonwealth. But it has failed to identify any constitutionally adequate reason for denying civil marriage to same-sex couples.<\/p>\n\n\n\n by Harriet Monroe<\/p>\n\n\n\n I love my life, but not too well I love my life, but not too well I love my life, but not too well by Harriet Monroe<\/p>\n\n\n\n Your love is like a blue blue wave It thrills me like great gales at war, by Patrick Murfin [UU]<\/p>\n\n\n\n “Love is the only magic \u2014 \/ It enriches the giver…”<\/p>\n\n\n\n Link to the poem<\/a><\/p>\n\n\n\n by Pablo Neruda<\/p>\n\n\n\n “\u2026I love you without knowing how, or when, or from where\u2026”<\/p>\n\n\n\n Link to poem<\/a><\/p>\n\n\n\n by Naomi Shihab Nye<\/p>\n\n\n\n “…there is no place large enough \/ to contain so much happiness…”<\/p>\n\n\n\n Link to the poem<\/a><\/p>\n\n\n\n This is not exactly a poem about marriage, but it could fit the mood of some wedding couples.<\/p>\n\n\n\n by Theodore Parker [UU]<\/p>\n\n\n\n \u2026It takes years to marry completely two hearts, even of the most loving and well-assorted. But nature allows no sudden change. We slope very gradually from the cradle to the summit of life. Marriage is gradual, a fraction of us at a time. A happy wedlock is a long falling in love. I know young persons think love belongs only to the brown hair, and plump, round cheek. So it does for its beginning, just as Mount Washington begins at Boston Bay. But the golden marriage is a part of love which the bridal day knows nothing of. Youth is the tassel and silken flower of love; age is the full corn, ripe and solid in the ear. Beautiful is the morning of love with its prophetic crimson, violet, saffron, purple, and gold, with its hopes of days that are to come. Beautiful also is the evening of love, with its glad remembrances, and its rainbow side turned towards heaven as well as earth\u2026.<\/p>\n\n\n\n A perfect and complete marriage, where wedlock is everything you could ask, and the ideal of marriage becomes actual, is not common\u2026. Men and women are married fractionally, now a small fraction, then a large fraction. Very few are married totally, and they only, I think, after some forty or fifty years of gradual approach and experiment….<\/p>\n\n\n\n “Phases of Domestic Life,” Collected Works of Theodore Parker,<\/em> vol. XIV, Lessons from the World of Matter and the World of Man<\/em> (London: Trubner & Co., 1872), pp. 151-152.<\/p>\n\n\n\n by Wilferd Arlan Peterson<\/p>\n\n\n\n This is one of the most popular readings for a wedding. Note that the real title is “The Art of Marriage,” not<\/em> “The Art of a Good Marriage.”<\/p>\n\n\n\n This reading is typically posted online without<\/em> permission from the copyright holder. It’s illegal to post the entire poem online without permission! And it’s bad luck to use pirated material in your wedding ceremony! However, I have a printed photocopy that I can loan to wedding couples, which I obtained legally from a library copy of Peterson’s book The New Art of Living<\/em> (New York: Simon and Schuster, 1963, pp. 44-45). Or you can go find a copy of his book in your local library library.<\/p>\n\n\n\n by Mary Pipher [UU]<\/p>\n\n\n\n This reading, from Mary Pipher’s “Letters to a Young Therapist,” used to be pirated on various wedding sites. But the author was able to have her copyrighted material removed from the web. And you didn’t want to use pirated material in your wedding anyway, because it’s bad luck. Fortunately, I have a book that includes this reading by permission of the author, which I can loan to wedding couples. Or you can get your own copy of We Pledge Our Hearts, ed. Edward Searl<\/a> (Boston: Skinner House, 2006), and find the reading on page 117. It’s worth it \u2014 while the reading is short, it’s perfect for a wedding.<\/p>\n\n\n\n by Adrienne Rich<\/p>\n\n\n\n “\u2026and I laugh and fall dreaming again \/ of the desire to show you to everyone I love\u2026”<\/p>\n\n\n\n Link to the poem<\/a><\/p>\n\n\n\n by Rainer Maria Rilke<\/p>\n\n\n\n “…and our heart felt like a single thing \/ beneath that vast disintegration of their brilliance…”<\/p>\n\n\n\n Link to the poem<\/a><\/p>\n\n\n\n by Christina Rossetti<\/p>\n\n\n\n My heart is like a singing bird Raise me a dais of silk and down; Note: “vair” is an obsolete term for a rich trimming on a robe or gown.<\/p>\n\n\n\n King James Version of the Bible<\/p>\n\n\n\n Intreat me not to leave thee, or to return from following after thee: for whither thou goest, I will go; and where thou lodgest, I will lodge: thy people shall be my people, and thy God my God.<\/p>\n\n\n\n (Non-religious weddings may leave off the last five words.)<\/p>\n\n\n\n by Sappho, translated by Dante Gabriel Rossetti<\/p>\n\n\n\n I II by William Shakespeare<\/p>\n\n\n\n Let me not to the marriage of true minds by Wallace Stevens<\/p>\n\n\n\n “\u2026Only we two may interchange \/ Each in the other what each has to give\u2026.”<\/p>\n\n\n\n Link to poem<\/a><\/p>\n\n\n\n by Sara Teasdale<\/p>\n\n\n\n Peace flows into me I am the pool of blue I am the pool of gold from Rivers to the Sea<\/em> (1915).<\/p>\n\n\n\n by Alfred Tennyson<\/p>\n\n\n\n Light, so low upon earth, by Henry David Thoreau [UU]<\/p>\n\n\n\n I think awhile of Love, and while I think, Two sturdy oaks I mean, which side by side, Above they barely touch, but undermined by Roscoe E. Trueblood [UU]<\/p>\n\n\n\n Lord, now thy rich rare blessings we would pray Roscoe Trueblood was minister at First Parish in Cohasset 1951-1969. This is from his book I Was Alive \u2014 and Glad,<\/em> published by First Parish in 1971 (p. 56), and used here by their permission.<\/p>\n\n\n\n by Carolyn Wells<\/p>\n\n\n\n “Until at last \/ They enter the same door, and suddenly \/ They meet.”<\/p>\n\n\n\nWhere We Belong, A Duet<\/h3>\n\n\n\n
Habitation<\/h3>\n\n\n\n
To My Dear and Loving Husband<\/h3>\n\n\n\n
If ever man were loved by wife, then thee.
If ever wife was happy in a man,
Compare with me, ye women, if you can.
I prize thy love more than whole mines of gold,
Or all the riches that the East doth hold.
My love is such that rivers cannot quench,
Nor ought but love from thee give recompense.
Thy love is such I can no way repay;
The heavens reward thee manifold, I pray.
Then while we live, in love let\u2019s so persevere,
That when we live no more, we may live ever.<\/p>\n\n\n\nfrom Jane Eyre<\/h3>\n\n\n\n
The Bean Eaters<\/h3>\n\n\n\n
Sonnets from the Portuguese 43: How do I love thee? Let me count the ways<\/h3>\n\n\n\n
I love thee to the depth and breadth and height
My soul can reach, when feeling out of sight
For the ends of being and ideal grace.
I love thee to the level of every day\u2019s
Most quiet need, by sun and candle-light.
I love thee freely, as men strive for right;
I love thee purely, as they turn from praise.
I love thee with the passion put to use
In my old griefs, and with my childhood\u2019s faith.
I love thee with a love I seemed to lose
With my lost saints. I love thee with the breath,
Smiles, tears, of all my life; and, if God choose,
I shall but love thee better after death.<\/p>\n\n\n\nA Red, Red Rose<\/h3>\n\n\n\n
That\u2019s newly sprung in June;
O my Luve is like the melody
That\u2019s sweetly played in tune.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
So deep in luve am I;
And I will luve thee still, my dear,
Till a\u2019 the seas gang dry.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
And the rocks melt wi\u2019 the sun;
I will love thee still, my dear,
While the sands o\u2019 life shall run.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
And fare thee weel awhile!
And I will come again, my luve,
Though it were ten thousand mile.<\/p>\n\n\n\n“i love you to the moon &”<\/h3>\n\n\n\n
blessing the boats<\/h3>\n\n\n\n
1 Corinthians, chapter 13<\/h3>\n\n\n\n
from The Love Tree<\/h3>\n\n\n\n
A seed, and you shall water it with tears,
And I shall weed it with my hands until
They bleed. Perchance this buried love of ours
Will fall on goodly ground and bear a tree
With fruit and flowers….<\/p>\n\n\n\nlove is more thicker than forget<\/h3>\n\n\n\n
“When two private individuals meet, so do two private worlds….”<\/h3>\n\n\n\n
“I gave myself to Him…”<\/h3>\n\n\n\n
And took Himself, for Pay,
The solemn contract of a Life
Was ratified, this way \u2014<\/p>\n\n\n\n
Myself a poorer prove
Than this great Purchaser suspect,
The Daily Own \u2014 of Love<\/p>\n\n\n\n
But till the Merchant buy \u2014
Still Fable \u2014 in the Isles of Spice \u2014
The subtle Cargoes \u2014 lie \u2014<\/p>\n\n\n\n
Some \u2014 found it \u2014 Mutual Gain \u2014
Sweet Debt of Life \u2014 Each Night to owe \u2014
Insolvent \u2014 every Noon \u2014<\/p>\n\n\n\nThe Good-Morrow<\/h3>\n\n\n\n
Did, till we loved? Were we not weaned till then?
But sucked on country pleasures, childishly?
Or snorted we in the Seven Sleepers\u2019 den?
\u2019Twas so; but this, all pleasures fancies be.
If ever any beauty I did see,
Which I desired, and got, \u2019twas but a dream of thee.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
Which watch not one another out of fear;
For love, all love of other sights controls,
And makes one little room an everywhere.
Let sea-discoverers to new worlds have gone,
Let maps to other, worlds on worlds have shown,
Let us possess one world, each hath one, and is one.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
And true plain hearts do in the faces rest;
Where can we find two better hemispheres,
Without sharp north, without declining west?
Whatever dies, was not mixed equally;
If our two loves be one, or, thou and I
Love so alike, that none do slacken, none can die.<\/p>\n\n\n\nInvitation to Love<\/h3>\n\n\n\n
Or come when the moon is mellow;
Come when the sun his golden bars
Drops on the hay-field yellow.
Come in the twilight soft and gray,
Come in the night or come in the day,
Come, O love, whene\u2019er you may,
And you are welcome, welcome.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
You are soft as the nesting dove.
Come to my heart and bring it to rest
As the bird flies home to its welcome nest.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
Or when my heart is merry;
Come with the falling of the leaf
Or with the redd\u2019ning cherry.
Come when the year\u2019s first blossom blows,
Come when the summer gleams and glows,
Come with the winter\u2019s drifting snows,
And you are welcome, welcome.<\/p>\n\n\n\nLove’s Apotheosis<\/h3>\n\n\n\n
To me may do.
If, but in spite of time and tears,
You prove but true.
Love me\u2014albeit grief shall dim mine eyes,
And tears bedew,
I shall not e\u2019en complain, for then my skies
Shall still be blue.
Love me, and though the winter snow shall pile,
And leave me chill,
Thy passion\u2019s warmth shall make for me, meanwhile,
A sun\u2013kissed hill.
And when the days have lengthened into years,
And I grow old,
Oh, spite of pains and griefs and cares and fears,
Grow thou not cold.
Then hand and hand we shall pass up the hill,
I say not down;
That twain go up, of love, who \u2018ve loved their fill,\u2014
To gain love\u2019s crown.
Love me, and let my life take up thine own,
As sun the dew.
Come, sit, my queen, for in my heart a throne
Awaits for you!<\/p>\n\n\n\n“What greater thing…”<\/h3>\n\n\n\n
from Give All to Love<\/h3>\n\n\n\n
Obey thy heart;
Friends, kindred, days,
Estate, good-fame,
Plans, credit and the Muse, \u2014
Nothing refuse.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
Let it have scope:
Follow it utterly,
Hope beyond hope:
High and more high
It dives into noon,
With wing unspent,
Untold intent:
But it is a god,
Knows its own path
And the outlets of the sky.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
It requireth courage stout.
Souls above doubt,
Valor unbending,
It will reward, \u2014
They shall return
More than they were,
And ever ascending\u2026.<\/p>\n\n\n\nfrom Union<\/h3>\n\n\n\n
from The Dear Togetherness<\/h3>\n\n\n\n
from The Dear Togetherness<\/h3>\n\n\n\n
On Marriage<\/h3>\n\n\n\n
And he answered saying:
You were born together, and together you shall be forevermore.
You shall be together when the white wings of death scatter your days.
Ay, you shall be together even in the silent memory of God.
But let there be spaces in your togetherness,
And let the winds of the heavens dance between you.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
Let it rather be a moving sea between the shores of your souls.
Fill each other\u2019s cup but drink not from one cup.
Give one another of your bread but eat not from the same loaf.
Sing and dance together and be joyous, but let each one of you be alone,
Even as the strings of the lute are alone though they quiver with the same music.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
For only the hand of Life can contain your hearts.
And stand together yet not too near together:
For the pillars of the temple stand apart,
And the oak tree and the cypress grow not in each other\u2019s shadow.<\/p>\n\n\n\nfrom On Love<\/h3>\n\n\n\n
And think not you can direct the course of love, for love, if it finds you worthy, directs your course.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
But if you love and must needs have desires, let these be your desires:
To melt and be like a running brook that sings its melody to the night.
To know the pain of too much tenderness.
To be wounded by your own understanding of love;
And to bleed willingly and joyfully.
To wake at dawn with a winged heart and give thanks for another day of loving;
To rest at the noon hour and meditate love\u2019s ecstasy;
To return home at eventide with gratitude;
And then to sleep with a prayer for the beloved in your heart and a song of praise upon your lips.<\/p>\n\n\n\nWe Are, Therefore We Love<\/h3>\n\n\n\n
from Concord<\/h3>\n\n\n\n
Illuminate our hearts and minds;
Rejoice in wonders daily shown,
In faith and joy, and love that binds.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
Surround and bless us through our days;
For these we sing in harmony,
Together giving thanks and praise….<\/p>\n\n\n\nfrom Growing Together<\/h3>\n\n\n\n
Interbeing<\/h3>\n\n\n\n
Of Love<\/h3>\n\n\n\n
Whether by th\u2019 eye, or eare, or no:
Or whether with the soule it came
(At first) infused with the same:
Whether in part \u2018tis here or there,
Or, like the soule, whole every where:
This troubles me: but as I well
As any other, this can tell;
That when from hence she does depart,
The out-let then is from the heart.<\/p>\n\n\n\nMy Loves<\/h3>\n\n\n\n
A-shining in the sky;
I love to see the little stars,
When the shadow clouds go by.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
On my roof-top in the night;
I love the soft wind\u2019s sighing,
Before the dawn\u2019s gray light.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
In my Lord\u2019s heaven above;
But better than all these things I think,
I love my own true love.<\/p>\n\n\n\nWe Have Lived and Loved Together<\/h3>\n\n\n\n
Through many changing years,
We have shared each other’s gladness,
And wept each other’s tears.
I have known ne’er a sorrow
That was long unsooth’d by thee,
For thy smile can make a summer
Where darkness else would be.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
In autumn’s fading hours;
Are the traitor smiles that darken,
When the cloud of sorrow lowers,
And though many such we’ve known, love,
Too prone alas! to range,
We both can speak of one, love,
Whom time can never change.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
Through many changing years,
We have shared each other’s gladness,
And wept each other’s tears.
And let us hope, the future,
As the past has been, will be,
I will share with thee thy sorrows,
And thou thy joys with me.<\/p>\n\n\n\nThe Awakening<\/h3>\n\n\n\n
That grew beside a lonely way,
Close by a path none ever chose,
And there I lingered day by day.
Beneath the sunshine and the show\u2019r
I grew and waited there apart,
Gathering perfume hour by hour,
And storing it within my heart,
Yet, never knew,
Just why I waited there and grew.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
That one day gaily flew along,
You came across the hedge to me,
And sang a soft, love-burdened song.
You brushed my petals with a kiss,
I woke to gladness with a start,
And yielded up to you in bliss
The treasured fragrance of my heart;
And then I knew
That I had waited there for you.<\/p>\n\n\n\nSong: to Celia<\/h3>\n\n\n\n
And I will pledge with mine;
Or leave a kiss but in the cup,
And I’ll not look for wine.
The thirst that from the soul doth rise
Doth ask a drink divine;
But might I of Jove’s nectar sup,
I would not change for thine.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
Not so much honoring thee
As giving it a hope, that there
It could not withered be.
But thou thereon didst only breathe,
And sent’st it back to me;
Since when it grows, and smells, I swear,
Not of itself, but thee.<\/p>\n\n\n\nPoem for My Love<\/h3>\n\n\n\n
from The Owl and the Pussycat<\/h3>\n\n\n\n
How charmingly sweet you sing!
O let us be married! too long we have tarried:
But what shall we do for a ring?”
They sailed away, for a year and a day,
To the land where the Bong-Tree grows
And there in a wood a Piggy-wig stood
With a ring at the end of his nose,
His nose,
His nose,
With a ring at the end of his nose.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
Your ring?” Said the Piggy, “I will.”
So they took it away, and were married next day
By the Turkey who lives on the hill.
They dined on mince, and slices of quince,
Which they ate with a runcible spoon;
And hand in hand, on the edge of the sand,
They danced by the light of the moon,
The moon,
The moon,
They danced by the light of the moon.<\/p>\n\n\n\nVows (for a Gay Wedding)<\/h3>\n\n\n\n
from Gift from the Sea<\/h3>\n\n\n\n
from Obergfell v. Hodges<\/h3>\n\n\n\n
from Goodridge v. Department of Public Health<\/h3>\n\n\n\n
from Love Songs<\/h3>\n\n\n\n
To give it to thee like a flower,
So it may pleasure thee to dwell
Deep in its perfume but an hour.
I love my life, but not too well.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
To sing is note by note away,
So to thy soul the song may tell
The beauty of the desolate day.
I love my life, but not too well.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
To cast it like a cloak on thine,
Against the storms that sound and swell
Between thy lonely heart and mine.
I love my life, but not too well.<\/p>\n\n\n\nfrom Love Songs<\/h3>\n\n\n\n
The little rainbows play in.
Your love is like a mountain cave
Cool shadows darkly stay in.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
It soothes like softest singing.
It bears me where clear rivers are,
With reeds and rushes swinging;
Or out to pearly shores afar
Where temple bells are ringing.<\/p>\n\n\n\nMerlin Said<\/h3>\n\n\n\n
One Hundred Love Sonnets: XVII<\/h3>\n\n\n\n
So Much Happiness<\/h3>\n\n\n\n
from Phases of Domestic Life<\/h3>\n\n\n\n
The Art of Marriage<\/h3>\n\n\n\n
“I knew a couple happily married for over 50 years…”<\/h3>\n\n\n\n
from Twenty-One Love Poems, poem II<\/h3>\n\n\n\n
Do You Remember Falling Stars<\/h3>\n\n\n\n
A Birthday<\/h3>\n\n\n\n
Whose nest is in a water’d shoot;
My heart is like an apple-tree
Whose boughs are bent with thickset fruit;
My heart is like a rainbow shell
That paddles in a halcyon sea;
My heart is gladder than all these
Because my love is come to me.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
Hang it with vair and purple dyes;
Carve it in doves and pomegranates,
And peacocks with a hundred eyes;
Work it in gold and silver grapes,
In leaves and silver fleurs-de-lys;
Because the birthday of my life
Is come, my love is come to me.<\/p>\n\n\n\nfrom the Book of Ruth<\/h3>\n\n\n\n
One Girl<\/h3>\n\n\n\n
Like the sweet apple which reddens upon the topmost bough,
Atop on the topmost twig, \u2014 which the pluckers forgot, somehow, \u2014
Forget it not, nay; but got it not, for none could get it till now.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
Like the wild hyacinth flower which on the hills is found,
Which the passing feet of the shepherds for ever tear and wound,
Until the purple blossom is trodden in the ground.<\/p>\n\n\n\nSonnet 116: Let me not to the marriage of true minds<\/h3>\n\n\n\n
Admit impediments. Love is not love
Which alters when it alteration finds,
Or bends with the remover to remove.
O no! it is an ever-fixed mark
That looks on tempests and is never shaken;
It is the star to every wand’ring bark,
Whose worth’s unknown, although his height be taken.
Love’s not Time’s fool, though rosy lips and cheeks
Within his bending sickle’s compass come;
Love alters not with his brief hours and weeks,
But bears it out even to the edge of doom.
If this be error and upon me prov’d,
I never writ, nor no man ever lov’d.<\/p>\n\n\n\nRe-Statement of Romance<\/h3>\n\n\n\n
Peace<\/h3>\n\n\n\n
As the tide to the pool by the shore;
It is mine forevermore,
It ebbs not back like the sea.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
That worships the vivid sky;
My hopes were heaven-high,
They are all fulfilled in you.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
When sunset burns and dies,
You are my deepening skies,
Give me your stars to hold.<\/p>\n\n\n\nMarriage Morning<\/h3>\n\n\n\n
You send a flash to the sun.
Here is the golden close of love,
All my wooing is done.
Oh, all the woods and the meadows,
Woods, where we hid from the wet,
Stiles where we stayed to be kind,
Meadows in which we met!
Light, so low in the vale
You flash and lighten afar,
For this is the golden morning of love,
And you are his morning star.
Flash, I am coming, I come,
By meadow and stile and wood,
Oh, lighten into my eyes and my heart,
Into my heart and my blood!
Heart, are you great enough
For a love that never tires?
O heart, are you great enough for love?
I have heard of thorns and briers.
Over the thorns and briers,
Over the meadows and stiles,
Over the world to the end of it
Flash of a million miles.<\/p>\n\n\n\nFriendship<\/h3>\n\n\n\n
Love is to me a world,
Sole meat and sweetest drink,
And close connecting link
Tween heaven and earth\u2026.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
Withstand the winter’s storm,
And spite of wind and tide,
Grow up the meadow’s pride,
For both are strong<\/p>\n\n\n\n
Down to their deepest source,
Admiring you shall find
Their roots are intertwined
Insep’rably.<\/p>\n\n\n\nPrayer for a marriage ceremony<\/h3>\n\n\n\n
On these who pledge their love and gladly go
Toward destiny \u2014 be it of joy or woe
And may their memory ever find its way
Back to the tender impulse of this day:
And may affection’s ties abound and grow
As each unselfish sharing makes it so:
From our heart’s depths these blessings now we pray.<\/p>\n\n\n\nFate<\/h3>\n\n\n\n