Wedded to Silence

     She thinks it’s enough,
and together we choose dresses,
lavender satin with dyed shoes.
We’ll wear our hair up, curled
and she’ll say the word forever.
Afterwards they’ll fly to Hawaii,
and make love on the beach,
never second-guessing this
next, natural, inevitable step.
She’ll be pregnant wihin the year.
          I’ll stay here,
and not smell the lei blossoms.
Instead I’ll comfort myself
with white lilacs and routine,
swearing a convenient (safe) love
would never be enough for me.
I’ll harbor the thought
of the preacher’s pause
and my own silence.
          What can I say,
draped in satin and holding flowers?
     (that she is a delicate insect
     and that he wants nothing more
     than the security of pinning her
     wings beating, to display for all)
Could I say I see her crushed,
unable to fly even the short distance
between herself and her dream,
weighted down by a mortgage,
three kids, and the mistakes of her mother?

I cannot.