Marriage
       

Here comes. Mirage in the middle of a long war.
Who brings this woman. Black forest cake white fondant flowers.
Bride wears opal. Necklace her grandmother recovered somehow.
After Bergen-Belsen. All rise. Garden of bouquets.
Winter sage pink roses. Hungarian groom fiddling with two rings.
One sized like a child's. Here comes. Organ so severe it reminds
of the surprise of marriage. Two trees grafted. The fruit of our.
Will both bear? Two figures stunned out of paradise,
the stained glass. Stunned into. The glass shattered underfoot
in a pocket of black velvet. Marriage, the rabbi says, is a covenant as difficult
to break as. Here comes. As difficult to dissolve into separate selves
as it would be to put back together. Here comes.
The fragments of this glass and drink from it whole again. Liberated
from Germany, grandfather hid in the forest a month, opal body
black trees. Displaced persons'
camp, she eighteen, thin and small as a lost child.
The two figures stunned into the negligible
sufferings, stunned into want. Stunned into articulation
and trying again tomorrow. Here comes. They vow.
We will we promise tomorrow and in sickness. We will not
leave. Two figures leaving
into November evening. Fractured sun. Music caught
behind heavy doors. Here. Sign of what is to. Comes.
Angel with the flaming sword. Here. I am so lucky, they said.
Final refugees allowed to enter from Germany. Please
rise. Bride wears her perfume in memory. Taut thread of suffering
pushed through the eye of a needle. Meticulous lace of history.
Bride holds a garden cut and tied with a line of silk. Smoke rise.
Eternal candle lit. Goodbye. Goodbye. Two stunned into
paradise. The couple tries
to forget the time when they were naked. Here. Here.

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Copyright © 2019 Katherine Noble All rights reserved
from West Branch
Reprinted by Verse Daily® with permission