Next poem is called "A Wedding."
She was in terrible pain the whole day
as she had been for months.
A slipped disk and there is nothing more painful.
She herself was a nurse's aide also a poet just beginning
to make a name for her nom de plume.
As with most things in life, it happened
when she was changing channels on her television.
[LAUGHING]
The lucky man, on the other hand,
was smiling for the first time in his life, and it was fake.
[LAUGHING]
He was an aspiring philosopher of dubious potential,
very serious but somehow lacking in essential depth.
He could have been an adequate undertaker.
[LAUGHING]
It was not the first time for either of them.
It was a civil service with no music, few flowers.
Still, there was a slow and erratic tide of champagne,
corks shot clear into the trees and flash
cubes, instant photos, some blurred
and some too revealing, cake slices that aren't what
they were meant to be.
The bride slept through much of it,
and never did we figure out who was on whose team.
I think the groom meant it in the end
when he said we never thought anyone would come.
[LAUGHING]
We were not the first to arrive, nor the last to leave.
Who knows?
It may all turn out for the best.
And who really cares about such special days.
They are not what we live for.
[LAUGHING]
I always feel particularly rotten
when I read that last line.
I can feel rotten about a lot of my poems, but I really mean it.
[LAUGHTER]