Open Writing

The train sweeps in a froth of white
The windows weep with coloured light
Miles of bride
Family pride
A bevy of bridesmaids in silky flounces
The little one skips and gently bounces
Page-boy picks at imagined fluff
On immaculate, blue-velvet stuff
And waves a lace-edged linen square
At the dust motes in the air.

Bridesmaid two practises a squint
Page-boy finds a fluff-covered mint.
“Do you take this woman to be…’’
pageboy plays with an unseen flea
Awestruck Amy squeezes flowers
Head-dress itches, it’s been hours
Since gel and comb and curling brush
All that hassle, all that rush.

“…to love and to cherish
in sickness and in health’’

Pageboy tiptoes with quiet stealth
and begins to count the church collection
bride’s mum in powder-blue confection
takes his arm and thrusts him back
to his place, she has the knack
where he miserably hangs his head
under threat of endless bed.

The organ thunders, the bride’s father cries
Amy kisses him better, very surprised
People ooh and aah and kiss
The couple grin their wedding bliss
Bridesmaids shiver and suck their thumbs
And moan about their rumbling tums.

Later there’s a disco floor to run around
Try aunty’s hat and leap and bound
And giggle and screech and play skitter-skatter
And just for once it doesn’t matter.
Then as adults become inebriated
Children fall asleep exhausted
Flushed and happy with rumpled hair
Grandma strokes their heads and whispers a prayer.