Whenever two people begin
To write
Their lives' poem
On a single leaf
Of hammered paper,
The angels sing,
And the ends of the universe,
Bright with stars,
More somehow closer.
So
Their joy together
Eternally
Becomes
God's smile

--James R. Scher

The Greatest Gift

All things I would give my love,
All things tender, caring, serving, true.
I would enwrap her in my loving arms
And shield her from all stress and pain.
I would enchant him with the vision bright
Of those rare gifts that are his deepest self.
and I would carry her on wings of joy
To all the heights the sould of man can know.

--Katharine Whiteside Taylor

The Ruins of the Heart

The minute I heard my first love story I started looking for you, not knowing how blind that was. Lovers don't finally meet somewhere. They're in each other all along.

--Rumi

Apache Wedding Blessing

Now you will feel no rain,
For each of you will be shelter to the other
Now you will feel no cold.
For each of you will be warmth to the other.
Now there is no loneliness
Now you are two persons
But there is one life between you
Go not to your dwelling place to enter into the days of your togetherness
And may your days be good and long upon the earth.

Rilke on Love and Other Difficulties

I want to be you, as much as I can, to be patient toward all that is unsolved in your heart and to try to love the questions themselves like locked rooms and like books that are written in a very foreign tongue. Do not seek the answers, which cannot be given you because you would not be able to live them. And the point is to live everything. Life the questions now. Perhaps you will then gradually, without noticing it, live along some distant day into the answer.

--Rainer Maria Rilke

Notes on Love and Courage

The quiet of thoughts
Of two people a long time in love
Touch lightly
Like birds nesting in each other’s warmth
You will know them by their laughter
But to each other
They speak mostly through their solitude
If they find themselves apart
They may dream of sitting undisturbed
In each other’s presence
Of wrapping themselves warmly
In each other’s easy.

--Hugh Prather

There be many shapes of mystery,
And many things God makes to be,
past hope or fear,
And the end men looked for cometh not,
And a path is there where no one sought.
So hath it fallen here.

--Euripedes

From “The Country of Marriage”

…our life reminds me
of a forest in which there is a graceful clearing
and in that opening a house,
an orchard and garden,
comfortable shades, and flowers...
The forest is mostly dark, its ways
to be made anew day after day, the dark
richer than the light and more blessed,
provided we stay brave
enough to keep on going in…

--Wendell Berry

Simple Gifts, Shaker Hymn

…when we find ourselves....

In the place just right
It will be in the valley
Of love and delight.

Letter from Victor Hugo to Adele Foucher

My Dearest,

When two souls, which have sought each other for, however long in the throng, have finally found each other ...a union, fiery and pure as they themselves are... begins on earth and continues forever in heaven.

This union is love, true love, ... a religion, which deifies the loved one, whose life comes from devotion and passion, and for which the greatest sacrifices are the sweetest delights.

This is the love which you inspire in me... Your soul is made to love with the purity and passion of angels; but perhaps it can only love another angel, in which case I must tremble with apprehension.

Yours forever,
Victor Hugo (1821)

My Love

When I met you, I had no idea
how much my life
was about to be changed...
but then, how could I have known?

A love like ours happens
once in a lifetime.
You were a miracle to me,
the one who was everything
I had ever dreamed of,
the one I thought existed
only in my imagination.

And when you came into my life,
I realized that what I
had always thought
was happiness
couldn't compare to the joy
loving you brought me.

You are a part of everything
I think and do and feel,
and with you by my side,
I believe that anything is possible.
(this day) gives me a chance
to thank you for the miracle of you...
you are, and always will be,
the love of my life.

--Linda Lee Elrod

Marriage Prayer

Lord,
help us to remember
when we first met
and the strong love
that grew between us.
Help us to work that love
into practical things
so nothing can divide us.
We ask for words
both kind and loving,
and for hearts always ready
to ask forgiveness
as well as to forgive.
Dear Lord,
we put our marriage
into Your hands.
Amen.

--Author Unknown

Wedding Day

Today
I give my heart to you
and only you--
forever.
I give you my trust,
my support
and my unconditional love.
I promise to be
your constant source of strength
and comfort.
I promise to be
your place of rest.
I promise you our love will be
endless.

--Mary Huff Chandler

From This Day Forward

From this day forward,
You shall not walk alone.
My heart will be your shelter,
And my arms will be your home.

--Author Unknown

Under the Chuppah

Under the chuppah,
the canopy shelters us
as if we stand under the protective wings of angels.
Vows and prayers are spoken.
A sacred journey begins.
We join our lives together.

Finishing our ceremony
the wine glass is shattered.
Piercing sound of glass breaking
reminds us to be prepared
for all the heartbreaking
and wonderful
moments of existence
We realize how fragile,
how magnificent is life,
is love.

The strong bond of our union
sanctifies this wedding day
by blessing received,
made holy here
under angels wings.

--Sherri Waas Shunfenthal

Engagement

A star is shining in my heart,
My dreams have wings that touch the sky,
I'd marry you a thousand times--
I'll love you till the day I die.

--Marion Schoeberlein

How Do I Love Thee

How do I love thee? Let me count the ways.
I love thee to the depth and breadth and height
My soul can reach, when feeling out of sight
For the ends of Being and ideal Grace.
I love thee to the level of everyday's
Most quiet need, by sun and candlelight.
I love thee freely, as men strive for Right;
I love thee purely, as they turn from Praise.
I love thee with the passion put to use
In my old griefs, and with my childhood's faith.
I love thee with a love I seemed to lose
With my lost saints, --I love thee with the breadth,
Smiles, tears, of all my life! --and, if God choose,
I shall love thee better after death.

--Elizabeth Barrett Browning (1806-1861)

The Promise

Within this blessed union of souls
Where two hearts intertwine to become one,
There lies a promise.
Perfectly born, divinely created, and intimately shared,
It is a place where the hope and majesty of beginnings reside.
Where all things are made possible
By the astounding love shared by two spirits.

As you hold each other's hands in this promise,
And eagerly look to the future in each other's eyes,
May your unconditional love and devotion
Take you to places of which you've both only dreamed,
Where you'll dwell for a lifetime of happiness
Sheltered in the warmth of each other's arms.

--Heather Berry

Finding Love

I find love
not only
in the things
we do together
but also
in the things
I do alone
because of you.
In the thoughts
you inspire,
in the dreams
you haunt, and
in the memories
you are helping
me to build.
I find love
in you.

--Robert J. Doebley

Love's Philosophy

The Fountains mingle with the River
And the Rivers with the Ocean,
The wings of Heaven mix for ever
With a sweet emotion;
Nothing in the world is single;
All things by a law divine
In one spirit meet and mingle.
Why not I wish thine?

See the mountains kiss high Heaven
And the waves clasp one another;
No sister-flower would be forgiven
If it disdained its brother,
And the sunlight clasps the earth
And the moonbeams kiss the sea:
What is all this sweet work worth
If thou kiss not me?

--Percy Bysshe Shelley (1792-1822)

Love Is Patient

Love is patient, love is kind.
It does not envy, it does not boast,
it is not proud. It is not rude,
it is not self-seeking,
it is not easily angered,
it keeps no record of wrongs.

Love does not delight in evil
but rejoices with the truth.
It always protects, always trusts,
always hopes, always perseveres.
Love never fails....

And now these three remain:
faith, hope and love.

But the greatest of these is love.

--I Corinthians 13:4-8, 13 (NIV)

Entering the Vow

What is a vow,
but an intention
spoken out before the world
so that the world, in hearing,
might take part
in aspirations
of the willing heart?
In our coming here today
to join and bless
the joy of your becoming wed,
may we enter in
the truth of the words you've said,
"I do."

--Maureen Tolman Flannery

Love

I love you,
Not only for what you are,
But for what I am
When I am with you.

I love you,
Not only for what
You have made of yourself,
But for what
You are making of me.

I love you
For the part of me
That you bring out;
I love you
For putting your hand
Into my heaped-up heart
And passing over
All the foolish, weak things
That you can't help

Dimly seeing there,
And for drawing out
Into the light
All the beautiful belongings
That no one else had looked
Quite far enough to find.

I love you because you
Are helping me to make
Of the lumber of my life
Not a tavern
But a temple;
Out of the works
Of my every day
Not a reproach
But a song.

I love you
Because you have done
More than any creed
Could have done
To make me good,
And more than any fate
Could have done
To make me happy.

You have done it
Without a touch,
Without a word,
Without a sign.
You have done it
By being yourself.
Perhaps that is what
Being a friend means,
After all.

--Roy Croft (1907-1973)

I Shall Love You

Sensual pleasure passes and vanishes in the twinkling of an eye, but the friendship between us, the mutual confidence, the delights of the heart, the enchantment of the soul, these things do not perish and can never be destroyed. I shall love you until I die.

--Voltaire (1694-1778)

The Passionate Shepherd to His Love

Come live with me and be my love,
And we will all the pleasures prove
That valleys, groves, hills, and fields,
Woods, or steepy mountain yields.

And we will sit upon the rocks
Seeing the shepherds feed their flocks,
By shallow rivers, to whose falls
Melodious birds sing madrigals.

And I will make thee beds of roses
And a thousand fragrant posies,
A cap of flowers and a kirtle
Embroider'd all with leaves of myrtle.

A gown made of the finest wool,
Which from our pretty lambs we pull;
Fair lined slippers for the cold,
With buckles of the purest gold.

A belt of straw and ivy buds,
With coral clasps and amber studs:
And if these pleasures may thee move,
Come live with me and be my love.

The shepherd swains shall dance and sing
For thy delight each May morning:
If these delights thy mind may move,
Then live with me and be my love.

--Christopher Marlowe (1564-1594)

When Two People Are at One

When two people are at one
in their inmost hearts
They shatter even the strength of iron
or of bronze.
And when two people understand each other in their inmost hearts
Their words are sweet and strong
like the fragrance of orchids.

--I Ching

You Were Born Together (from The Prophet)

You were born together, and together you shall be forevermore.
You shall be together when the white wings of death scatter your days.
Aye, you shall be together even in the silent memory of God.
But let there be spaces in your togetherness.
And let the wings of the heavens dance between you.
Love one another but make not a bond of love:
Let it rather be a moving sea between the shores of your souls.
Fill each other's cup but drink not from one cup.
Give one another of your bread but eat not from the same loaf.
Sing and dance together and be joyous, but let each of you be alone,
Even as the strings of the lute are alone though they quiver
with the same music.
Give your hearts, but not into each other's keeping.
For only the hands of Life can contain your hearts.
And stand together, yet not too near together:
For the pillars of the temple stand apart,
And the oak tree and the cypress grow in each other's shadow.

--Kahlil Gibran (1883-1931)

What Greater Thing

What greater thing is there for two human souls,
than to feel that they are joined for life--
to strengthen each other in all labor,
to rest on each other in all sorrow,
to minister to each other in all pain,
to be one with each other
in silent unspeakable memories...

--George Eliot (1819-1880)

i carry your heart with me(i carry it in

i carry your heart with me(i carry it in
my heart)i am never without it(anywhere
i go you go, my dear;and whatever is done
by only me is your doing,my darling)
i fear
no fate(for you are my fate,my sweet)i want
no world(for beautiful you are my world,my true)
and it's you are whatever a moon has always meant
and whatever a sun will always sing is you

here is the deepest secret nobody knows
(here is the root of the root and the bud of the bud
and the sky of the sky of a tree called life;which grows
higher than soul can hope or mind can hide)
and this is the wonder that's keeping the stars apart

i carry your heart(i carry it in my heart)

--e.e. Cummings (American, 1894-1962)

Love

Love bade me welcome: yet me soul drew back,
Guilty of dust and sin.
But quick-eyed Love, observing me grow slack
From my first entrance in,
Drew nearer to me, sweetly questioning,
If I lacked anything.

A guest, I answered, worthy to be here:
Love said, You shall be he.
I the unkind, ungrateful? Ah my dear,
I cannot look on thee.
Love took my hand, and smiling did reply,
Who made the eyes but I?

Truth Lord, but I have marred them: let my shame
Go where it doth deserve.
And know you not, says Love, who bore the blame?
My dear, then I will serve.
You must sit down, says Love, and taste my meat:
So I did sit and eat.

--George Herbert (English, 1593-1633)

from The Love Poems of Marichiko

You ask me what I thought about
Before we were lovers.
The answer is easy.
Before I met you
I didn't have anything to think about.

Who is there? Me.
Me who? I am me. You are you.
You take my pronoun,
And we are us.

Love me. At this moment we
Are the happiest
People in the world.

--Marichiko (Kenneth Rexroth) (American, 1905-1982)

The Saint's First Wife Said

I woke to your face not looking at me
but at the bird that settled on your wrist,
lured by food. Its trust, for once, was rewarded.
You offered the bird everything you had.

I remember. That is how it began
with us: You held out your hand; I took it.

--G. E. Patterson (American, b. 1960)

I Remember

By the first of August
the invisible beetles began
to snore and the grass was
as tough as hem and was
no color -- no more than
the sand was a color and
we had worn our bare feet
bare since the twentieth
of June and there were times
we forgot to wind up your
alarm clock and some nights
we took our gin warm and neat
from old jelly glasses while
the sun blew out of sight
like a red picture hat and
one day i tied my hair back
with a ribbon and you said
that i looked almost like
a puritan lady and what
I remember best is that
the door to your room was
the door to mine.

--Anne Sexton (American, 1928-1974)

Let me not to the marriage of true minds

Let me not to the marriage of true minds
Admit impediments; love is not love
Which alters when it alteration finds,
Or bends with the remover to remove.
O no, it is an ever-fixed mark
That looks on tempests and is never shaken;
It is the star to every wandering bark,
Whose worth's unknown, although his height be taken.
Love's not Time's fool, though rosy lips and cheeks
Within his bending sickle's compass come;
Love alters not with his brief hours and weeks,
But bears it out even to the edge of doom.
If this be error and upon me proved,
I never writ, nor no man ever loved.

--William Shakespeare (English, 1564-1616)

Shall I compare thee to a summer's day?

Shall I compare thee to a summer's day?
Thou art more lovely and more temperate.
Rough winds do shake the darling buds of May,
And summer's lease hath all too short a date.
Sometime too hot the eye of heaven shines,
And often is his gold complexion dimmed;
And every fair from fair sometimes declines,
By chance or nature's changing course untrimmed.
But thy eternal summer shall not fade,
Nor lose possession of that fair thou ow'st,
Nor shall Death brag thou wand'rest in his shade,
When in eternal lines to time thou grow'st.
So long as men can breathe or eyes can see,
So long lives this, and this gives life to thee.

--William Shakespeare (English, 1564-1616)

from Amoretti

One day I wrote her name upon the strand,
But came the waves and washed it away:
Agayne I wrote it with a second hand,
But came the tyde, and made my paynes his pray.
Vayne man, sayd she, that doest in vaine assay,
A mortall thing so to immortalize,
For I my selve shall lyke to this decay,
And eek my name bee wyped our lykewize.
Not so, (quod I) let baser things devize
To dy in dust, but you shall live by fame:
My verse your vertues rare shall eternize,
And in the hevens wryte your glorious name.
Where whenas death shall all the world subdew,
Our love shall live, and later life renew.

--Edmund Spenser (English, 1552-1599)

Oblation

Ask nothing more of me, sweet;
All I can give you I give.
Heart of my heart, were it more,
More would be laid at your feet:
Love that should help you to live,
Song that should spur you to soar.

All things were nothing to give
Once to have sense of you more,
Touch you and taste of you sweet,
Think you and breathe you and live,
Swept of your wings as they soar,
Trodden by chance of your feet.

I that have love and no more
Give you but love of you, sweet:
He that hath more, let him give;
He that hath wings, let him soar;
Mine is the heart at your feet
Here, that must love you to live.

--Algernon Charles Swinburne

I Would Live in Your Love

I would live in your love as the sea-grasses live in the sea,
Borne up by each wave as it passes, drawn down by each wave
that recedes;
I would empty my soul of the dreams that have gathered in me,
I would beat with your heart as it beats, I would follow your soul
as it leads.

--Sara Teasdale

Love Much

Love much. Earth has enough of bitter in it;
Cast sweets into its cup whene'er you can.
No heart so hard, but love at last may win it;
Love is the grand primeval cause of main;
All hate is foreign to the first great plan.

Love much. Your heart will be led out to slaughter,
On altars built of envy and deceit.
Love on, love on! 'tis bread upon the water;
It shall be cast in loaves yet at your feet,
Unleavened manna, most divinely sweet.

Love much. Your faith will be dethroned and shaken,
Your trust betrayed by many a fair, false lure.
Remount your faith, and let new trusts awaken.
Though clouds obscure them, yet the stars are pure;
Love is a vital force and must endure.

Love much. Men's souls contract with cold suspicion,
Shine on them with warm love, and they expand.
'Tis love, not creeds, that from a low condition
Lead mankind up to heights supreme and grand.
Oh, that the world could see and understand!

Love much. There is no waste in freely giving;
More blessed is it, even, than to receive.
He who loves much, alone finds life worth living;
Love on, through doubt and darkness; and believe
There is no thing which Love may not achieve.

--Ella Wheeler Wilcox

It is one of life's richest surprises when the accidental meeting of two life paths leads them to proceed together along the common path of man and wife, and it is one of life's finest experiences when a casual relationship grows into a permanent bond of love. This meeting and this growth bring us together today.

--Anonymous

Love's Tranquility

My true love hath my heart, and I have his,
By just exchange one for another given:
I hold his dear, and mine he cannot miss,
There never was a better bargain driven:
My true love hath my heart, and I have his.

His heart in me keeps him and me in one,
My heart in him his thought and senses guides:
He loves my heart, for once it was his own,
I cherish his, because in me it bides:
My true love hath my heart, and I have his.

--Philip Sidney

Sonnet III

I would not have this perfect love of ours
Grow from a single root, a single stem,
Bearing no goodly fruit, but only flowers
That idly hide life's iron diadem:
It should grow always like that Eastern tree
Whose limbs take root and spread forth constantly;
That love for one, from which there doth not spring
Wide love for all, is but a worthless thing.
Not in another world, as poets prate,
Dwell we apart above the tide of things,
High floating o'er earth's clouds on faery wings;
But our pure love doth ever elevate
Into a holy bond of brotherhood
All earthly things, making them pure and good.

--James Russell Lowell

It is for the union of you and me
that there is light in the sky.
It is for the union of you and me
that the earth is decked in dusky green.

It is for the union of you and me
that night sits motionless with the world in her arms;
dawn appears opening the eastern door
with sweet murmurs in her voice.

The boat of hope sails along on the currents of
eternity towards that union,
flowers of the ages are being gathered together
for its welcoming ritual.

It is for the union of you and me
that this heart of mine, in the garb of a bride,
has proceeded from birth to birth
upon the surface of this ever-turning world
to choose the Beloved.

--Rabindranath Tagore
[tr. Indu Dutt]

Not from pride, but from humility
As mortals, with human weaknesses
And strengths
You stand alone today
And promise faith.
Your faith you find as you live,
Each moment consecrated to
A search for Truth
And for that Good
Whose presence you have deeply felt.

NOW:
From this time, until
The time you must rejoin the
Earth from which you came,
Love the love in you that underlies
Your actions.
And with each other,
Share your wonder at the beauty
That you find
As Man and Wife.

--James Lawson

I love you. I will always try to be patient and kind, rather than envious or boastful. I will not put on airs, nor behave myself unseemly, nor keep insisting upon my rights. I will not be provoked to anger, nor harbor resentment by taking account of fancied evils. I will rejoice, not over unrighteousness, but only with the truth. I will try to bear all things and to endure any fate which may come to us, and in spite of change, to believe in you and to hope for our happiness together. I shall never fail you. This is what I mean when I say, "I love you."

--Paul of Tarsus
[arr. Elmo A. Robinson]

The Master Speed

Back up a stream of radiance to the sky,
And back through history up the stream of time.
And you were given this swiftness, not for haste,
Nor chiefly that you may go where you will,
But in the rush of everything to waste,
That you may have the power of standing still--
Off any still or moving thing you say.
Two such as you with such a master speed
Cannot be parted nor be swept away
From one another once you are agreed
That life is only life forevermore
Together wing to wing and oar to oar.

--Robert Frost

From George Eliot

What greater thing is there for two human souls
Than to feel that they are joined for life—to
Strengthen each other in all labor, to rest on each
Other in all sorrow, to minister to each other in all
Pain, to be one with each other in silent,
Unspeakable memories at the moment of the last
Parting.

--George Eliot

Believe Me, If All These Endearing Young Charms

Believe me, if all these endearing young charms,
Which I gaze on so fondly to-day,
Were to change by to-morrow, and fleet in my arms,
Like fairy-gifts fading away,
Thou wouldst still be adored, as this moment thou art,
Let thy loveliness fade as it will,
And around the dear ruin each wish of my heart
Would entwine itself verdantly still.

It is not while beauty and youth are thine own,
And thy cheeks unprofaned by a tear,
That the fervor and faith of a soul may be known,
To which time will but make thee more dear!
No, the heart that has truly loved never forgets,
But as truly loves on to the close,
As the sunflower turns to her god when he sets
The same look which she turned when he rose!

--Thomas Moore, 19th Century

Two Trees

A portion of your soul has been
Entwined with mine.
A gentle kind of togetherness, while
Separately we stand.
As two trees deeply rooted in
Separate plots of ground,
While their topmost branches,
Come together,
Forming a miracle of lace
Against the heavens.

--Janet Miles, 20th Century`

The Couple’s Tao Te Ching: “See Clearly”

Your love is a great mystery.
It is like an eternal lake
Whose waters are always still and clear like glass.
Looking into it you can see
The truth about your life.

It is like a deep well
Whose waters are cool and pure.
Drinking from it you can be reborn.

You do not have to stir the waters
Or dig the well.
Merely see yourself clearly
And drink deeply.

--Lau Tzu, 6th Century (Interpreted by William Martin)