noun
- a solemn promise.
- (vows) a set of promises committing one to a prescribed role, calling, or course of action, typically to marriage or a monastic career.
- [reporting verb] solemnly promise to do a specified thing: [with clause]
- [with object] archaic dedicate to someone or something, especially a deity
The supermoon appears above the temporarily closed Hotel Pere
Marquette in Peoria, Ill.
Adam Gerik / AP -------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
By the time I went to bed, the clock showed well past midnight. We'd started early that day, with a bowl of blueberry oatmeal. When I showered and dressed in my 'day-of' clothes, I dressed carefully, deliberately. I blew my hair dry slowly, on the low heat setting, and put in tiny purple earrings.
We packed the car, hanging our attire on opposite sides of the back of the freshly detailed Subaru Forester, my dress stretching across the entire backseat.
It rained lightly on the way there...up the highway and into Montrose, where we stopped to pick up the arrangement and individual roses for the altar and see the arrangements for the tables at the reception, to be held later that evening, back in Montrose...and we started out again...
The sky was clear by the time we reached Binghamton. The perfect May weather we'd been tracking all week arrived when we did. Our wedding party and those participating in the ceremony were already there. We ran through the ceremony, handed out gifts to our bridal party, and to those participating. And then we ate some lunch.
Nearly right before we started, we both got changed...together, along with our bridal party.
Kim and Unc went to their side of the church, my father and I, the other. Unc walked Kim in the front of the round church with the blue carpet, while my father walked me in from the other side. The intro to our wedding song played...simple guitar...before our dear friends, Ed and Liz, started to sing the Jason Mraz song, 'I Won't Give Up'...
Sarah read a passage from The Velveteen Rabbit, Dr. Becky a poem of Maya Angelou's. Devin read from A Gift from the Sea, and Marlo from 1st Corinthians.
And before you knew it, there were vows to be spoken. I tucked my hand behind my back and tried not to pay attention to the microphone. And I read to her my vows:
"When I teach and my students are nervous sharing their writing, we often start with them reading someone else’s words. It gives them a chance to express what they think and feel while helping to ease them into confidence in their own thoughts, feelings, and voice.
So let me start by doing the same-- a poem, for you from me, written by the late Adrienne Rich: I wake up in your bed. I know I have been dreaming.
Much earlier, the alarm broke us from each other,
you’ve been at your desk for hours. I know what I dreamed:
our friend the poet comes into my room
where I’ve been writing for days,
drafts, carbons, poems are scattered everywhere,
and I want to show her one poem
which is the poem of my life. But I hesitate,
and wake. You’ve kissed my hair
to wake me. I dreamed you were a poem,
I say, a poem I wanted to show someone…;
and I laugh and fall dreaming again
of the desire to show you to everyone I love,
to move openly together
in the pull of gravity, which is not simple,
which carried the feathered grass a long way down the upbreathing air.
Kim, my Velveteen, today I am grateful for many things.
I am grateful for every day we have together.
I am grateful for 5s. February 5th: the anniversary of my final chemotherapy treatment. April 5th: the anniversary of your open heart surgery. I am grateful for May 5th--this day, a day we stand in grace to express the belief we share in the power of love and goodness-- this day when I can show you to everyone--when I can recite the poetry you are to the people we love.
Though grateful for many things, today I am most grateful for our struggles. Kites do indeed rise highest against the wind. When I think about the winds against which we've stood together, I recognize that our struggles have given me courage--They have encouraged me to a place where I stand differently secure in how deeply I love you and the life we have together.
You know I am a lover of words but in this moment words do not do what the best words can. In this moment words fall short of the unending poetry I want to give you.
Today, the power of the words is in the speaking--in the standing with you and everyone else who has chosen to be here with us, as we celebrate this amazing day, because they love us as much as I love you-- as much as we love them--they have helped us hold the kites in the air.
Today, I promise to love you as I always have and always will. I promise to sing you funny songs and whistle the last note of your off-season Christmas tunes. Today I promise, no matter what struggles we are yet to meet, that I will stand with you and let our joy of this life see us simply to a place of health--to a place of growth-- to a place of even greater love.
Today, I am grateful for my voice--grateful for the power in telling you, and everyone else, I love you."
And we were pronounced married. Rings on our fingers and a kiss between us, 14 years of being together had all led to May 5th.
And Ed and Liz sang again...and I cried as she hit the notes that linger from 'In This Heart'--
We walked out, hand in hand, stood in line and hugged those we love most. There were pictures, and later, there was dinner and a reception and finally, later, a quiet space opened in which the smile we'd started earlier that day burned into each of us in a way that we'd be able to get back to it forever.
A year later, I'm back to that smile...the same smile. And it's brighter than the supermoon that graced the sky on May 5th, 2012. Such hope...such love...
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