The Brigidaire General Speaks At The Wedding Poem by RIC BASTASA

the retired general speaks
at the wedding
in an open garden, about marriage,

that one must marry for love
and no other
because when love is gone
then everything is gone

i look at my wife waiting for her turn
to speak
and i am thinking: what if love is gone?

what if love flies out of the window like a black bird
tired of its nest wanting to go and find another island
a new breeding ground
a direction for another migration
away from a very cold season
towards a warmer ground?

i think, one marries more than love,
one makes a promise
for better or for worse, for richer or poorer,
in sickness and in health

till death do us part: one marries not just for love
but for a promise,
for marriage is more than that, it is more than a contract,
it is a covenant,

that we who love, that we sometime
when we fall out of love
looks at the covenant and
abides by what is found there

that we live together, that we are one, and only death can separate us.
the assumption is: love sometimes burns itself, and is consumed
like our bodies that rot, like our bones that turn to dust,
like the life that dies, that the mind that shuts down

i think, i am falling out of love, i think,
i must abide by the covenant.

after the General has spoken
i shake his hand, and make a nod,
i admit, i still have more to say,
but it shall be my wife who must say it.

she signed the covenant too
inside our heart, our souls know it.