I've started my search for some offbeat readings for my wedding in October… have you compiled a list anywhere of readings from modern literature, songs, etc that are a little edgier and more current than the traditional? -Buster
This is one of those questions where I bow down to the all-mighty altar of Indiebride.com. If you're looking for readings that have a few less thou shalts than your typical wedding material, you must check out Indiebride.com. See, the members of Indiebride's forum have built an amazing 16-page repository of awesome readings!
Here are a few of my very favorites, which include references to science-fiction vampires, insomnia, and red right ankles.
Understand, I'll slip quietly
Away from the noisy crowd
When I see the pale
Stars rising, blooming over the oaks.
I'll pursue solitary pathways
Through the pale twilit meadows,
With only this one dream:
You come too.
From "First Poems," Rainer Maria Rilke
Our union is like this:
You feel cold so I reach for a blanket to cover
our shivering feet.A hunger comes into your body
so I run to my garden and start digging potatoes.You asked for a few words of comfort and guidance and
I quickly kneel by your side offering you
a whole book as a
gift.You ache with loneliness one night so much
you weep, and I sayhere is a rope, tie it around me,
Hafiz will be your
companion
for life.Our Union, by Hafiz From "Love Poems from God," Daniel Ladinsky (ed), c2002
Red Right Ankle by the decemberists
this is the story of your red right ankle
and how it came to meet your leg
and how the muscle bone and sinews tangled
and how the skin was softly shaped
and how it whispered 'oh, adhere to me
for we are bound by symmetry
and whatever differences our lives have been
we together make a limb'
this is the story of your red right ankle
To Love is Not to Possess
James Kavanaugh
To love is not to possess,
To own or imprison,
Nor to lose one's self in another.
Love is to join and separate,
To walk alone and together,
To find a laughing freedom
That lonely isolation does not permit.
It is finally to be able
To be who we really are
No longer clinging in childish dependency
Nor docilely living separate lives in silence,
It is to be perfectly one's self
And perfectly joined in permanent commitment
To another–and to one's inner self.
Love only endures when it moves like waves,
Receding and returning gently or passionately,
Or moving lovingly like the tide
In the moon's own predictable harmony,
Because finally, despite a child's scars
Or an adult's deepest wounds,
They are openly free to be
Who they really are–and always secretly were,
In the very core of their being
Where true and lasting love can alone abide.
The Invitation, by Oriah Mountain Dreamer
It doesn't interest me what you do for a living.I want to know what you ache for, and if you dare to dream of meeting your hearts longing.
It doesn't interest me how old you are. I want to know if you will risk looking a fool for love,
for your dreams, for the adventure of being alive.It doesn't interest me what planets are square in your moon.
I want to know if you have touched the center of your own sorrow,
if you have been opened by life's betrayals or have become shriveled and closed down from fear of further pain.I want to know if you can sit with pain, mine or your own, without moving, to hide it, fade it, or fix it.
I want to know if you can be with joy, mine or your own; if you can dance with wildness and let ecstasy fill you to the tips of your fingers and toes without cautioning us to be careful, be realistic, or to remember the limitations of being human.
It doesn't interest me if the story you are telling me is true.
I want to know if you can disappoint another to be true yourself;
if you can bear the accusation of betrayal and not betray your own soul. I want to know if you can be faithful and therefore trustworthy.I want to know if you can see beauty even when it is not pretty every day, and if you can source your life on the edge of the lake and shout to the silver of the moon in God’s presence.
It doesn't interest me to know where you live or how much money you have.
I want to know if you can get up after a night of grief and despair, weary and bruised to the bone, and do what needs to be done for the children.
It doesn't interest me who you know, or how you came here.
I want to know if you will stand in the center of the fire with me and not shrink back.
It doesn't interest me where or what or with whom you have studied.
I want to know what sustains you from the inside when all else falls away.
I want to know if you can be alone with yourself, and if you truly like the company you keep in empty moments.
Adrienne Rich, 21 Love Poems
Whenever in this city, screens flicker
with pornography, with science-fiction vampires,
victimized hirelings bending to the lash,
we also have to walk…if simply as we walk
through the rainsoaked garbage, the tabloid cruelties
of our own neighborhoods.
We need to grasp our lives inseparable
from those rancid dreams, that blurt of metal, those disgraces,
and the red begonia perilously flashing
from a tenement sill six stories high,
or the long-legged young girls playing ball
in the junior highschool playground.
No one has imagined us. We want to live like trees,
sycamores blazing through the sulfuric air,
dappled with scars, still exuberantly budding,
our animal passion rooted in the city.
When I am with you, we stay up all night.
When you're not here, I can't go to sleep.Praise God for these two insomnias!
And the difference between them.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.We are the mirror as well as the face in it.
We are tasting the taste this minute
of eternity. We are pain
and what cures pain, both. We are
the sweet cold water and the jar that pours.I want to hold you close like a lute, so we can cry out with loving.
You would rather throw stones at a mirror?
I am your mirror, and here are the stones.–The Essential Rumi, translated by Coleman Barks
Love by Roy Croft
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.
From The Irrational Season
By Madeleine L'EngleBut ultimately there comes a moment when a decision must be made. Ultimately two people who love each other must ask themselves how much they hope for as their love grows and deepens, and how much risk they are willing to take. It is indeed a fearful gamble. Because it is the nature of love to create, a marriage itself is something which has to be created, so that, together we become a new creature.
To marry is the biggest risk in human relations that a person can take.If we commit ourselves to one person for life this is not, as many people think, a rejection of freedom; rather it demands the courage to move into all the risks of freedom, and the risk of love which is permanent; into that love which is not possession, but participation. It takes a lifetime to learn another person. When love is not possession, but participation, then it is part of that co-creation which is our human calling, and which implies such risk that it is often rejected.
‘The Book of Love’ by Stephen Merritt (The Magnetic Fields)
From the album 69 Love Songs
The book of love is long and boring
No one can lift the damn thing
It's full of charts and facts and figures
and instructions for dancingBut I, I love it when you read to me
And you, you can read me anythingThe book of love has music in it
In fact that's where music comes from
Some of it is just transcendental
Some of it is just really dumbBut I, I love it when you sing to me
And you you can sing me anythingThe book of love is long and boring
And written very long ago
It's full of flowers and heart-shaped boxes
And things we're all too young to knowBut I, I love it when you give me things
And you, you ought to give me wedding ringsI, I love it when you give me things
And you, you ought to give me wedding rings
…and that's just the tip of the iceberg! There are so many more over on Indiebride.com. Also, I'd love to invite my readers to share their favorite modern, non-"thou shalt" readings in the comments …
Comments on "Awesome wedding readings for bad-ass couples"
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kate
July 2nd, 2008 · 6:04 AM · #
there are loads on http://weddingwords.vox.com if you want to search by themed tags
Fae
July 2nd, 2008 · 6:18 AM · #
My two favorite bands in this post?! Ariel, you just made the OBB even more awesome.
The Magnetic Fields have another great song along the same lines –
It's Only Time
Why would I stop loving you
a hundred years from now?
It's only time.
It's only time.
What could stop this beating heart
once it's made a vow?
It's only time.
It's only time.
If rain won't change your mind,
let it fall.
The rain won't change my heart
at all.
Lock this chain
around my hand,
throw away the key.
It's only time.
It's only time.
Years falling
like grains of sand
mean nothing to me.
It's only time.
It's only time.
If snow won't change your mind
let it fall.
The snow won't change my heart,
not at all.
(I'll walk your lands)
I'll walk your lands
(And swim your sea)
And swim your sea
Marry me.
Marry me.
(Then in your hands)
Then in your hands
(I will be free)
I will be free
Marry me.
Marry me.
Why would I stop loving you
a hundred years from now?
Jennifer
July 2nd, 2008 · 6:47 AM · #
Can I add one that we're using? Feel free to take it off the comments if this is the wrong place to post, but we found it hard to find a lovely reading that relates to offbeat mountain bikers!
Feel free to use: A Marriage Made for Two
A successful marriage can learn a lot from bicycle riding.
You should promise each other that you will not be fair weather riders, but venture out together in the wind and the rain. Only by braving the storms as a team will you reap the rewards when the sunshine arrives.
Look after each other. A well oiled bike will run smoothly and change gear easily.
Marriage is like a tandem…keep pedalling or the one at the front shouts at you!
You should promise each other to not only enjoy new adventures and explorations, but appreciate the same old routes you know and love.
Marriage is a promise to each other to endure the climbs so that you may chase the swoops and swerves of perfect singletrack.
The journey may be long and may have hills ahead, but if you climb together with love and passion, you will be able to achieve everything you both desire!
Wishing you all the best from the start line of the greatest endurance event of your lives. Good luck and may each lap be a great adventure.
Our friend is reading this for us. We actually wrote it ourselves, using some of the lovely comments guests had written with their RSVP's.
jennifer chernoff
July 2nd, 2008 · 7:29 AM · #
I still like Sonnet 136 by Willy Shakespeare. Also, there is a reverend who blogs and wrote something quite lovely recently about taking risks in terms of love and the lifespan of a relationship.
mordicai
July 2nd, 2008 · 8:00 AM · #
Hey, look at me there in the blue tie getting married! Our reading was from "Scary Stories to Tell in the Dark" & was the "Green Ribbon."
Jess
July 2nd, 2008 · 8:18 AM · #
Excuse me, I just died from that Rilke poem. Rilke! He is some kind of Teutonic super-genius.
Jess L.
July 2nd, 2008 · 8:21 AM · #
When we started looking for wedding readings I especially had a very hard time – I'd start going through the Neruda and Rilke poems and, though they were often lovely, my eyes just glazed over and I couldn't foster any personal connection with any of them. But we finally found some GREAT things – here's what we read when we got married a few weeks ago!
READING ONE:
From Colin's grandmother, a Miss Manners lover, the following excerpt.
"While exclusionary interest in one other human being, which is what we call courtship, is all very exciting in the stages of discovery, there is not enough substance in it for a lifetime, no matter how fascinating the people or passionate the romance.
The world, on the other hand, is chock full of interesting and curious things. The point of the courtship — marriage — is to secure someone with whom you wish to go hand in hand through this source of entertainment, each making discoveries, and then sharing some and merely reporting others. Anyone who tries to compete with the entire world, demanding to be someone's sole source of interest and attention, is asking to be classified as a bore. "Why don't you ever want to talk to me?" will probably never start a satisfactory marital conversation. "Guess what?" will probably never fail."
READING TWO:
My Dad – the only one who actually chose his own reading – read from Da Vinci's notebooks some Notes on the Construction of Arches, interspersed with his own commentary on how this actually is all about marriage. (I don't yet have a transcript of his words, alas, which were really the best part.)
"WHAT IS AN ARCH?
The arch is nothing else than a force originated by two weaknesses,
for the arch in buildings is composed of two segments of a circle, each of which being very weak in itself tends to fall; but as each opposes this tendency in the other, the two weaknesses combine to form one strength.
OF THE KIND OF PRESSURE IN ARCHES.
As the arch is a composite force it remains in equilibrium because
the thrust is equal from both sides; and if one of the segments
weighs more than the other the stability is lost, because the
greater pressure will outweigh the lesser.
ON THE STRENGTH OF THE ARCH.
The way to give stability to the arch is to fill the spandrils with
good masonry up to the level of its summit."
READING THREE:
My dear friend Katie read a selection from the Massachusetts State Supreme Court ruling on Gay Marriage, and we briefly mentioned how awe-inspiring it was that in our very city, in only two days, EVERYONE was about to get the right to marry. The cheer our guests let up was a joy to hear.
"Civil marriage is at once a deeply personal commitment to another human being and a highly public celebration of the ideals of mutuality, companionship, intimacy, fidelity, and family. It is an association that promotes a way of life, not causes; a harmony in living, not political faiths; a bilateral loyalty, not commercial or social projects.
Because it fulfills yearnings for security, safe haven, and connection that express our common humanity, civil marriage is an esteemed institution and the decision whether and whom to marry is among life's momentous acts of self-definition. Tangible as well as intangible benefits flow from marriage. The benefits accessible only by way of a marriage license are enormous, touching nearly every aspect of life and death.
It is undoubtedly for these concrete reasons, as well as for its intimately personal significance, that civil marriage has long been termed a civil right."
READING FOUR:
Colin's sister read an excerpt from "So Long, and Thanks for All the Fish," included partially because the HHGttG being a crucially formative book for me when I was a child, and partially because it is awesome:
"They looked at each other for a moment.
The moment became a longer moment, and suddenly it was a very long moment, so long one could hardly tell where all the time was coming from.
For Arthur, who could usually contrive to feel self-conscious if left alone for long enough with a Swiss Cheese plant, the moment was one of sustained revelation. He felt on the sudden like a cramped and zoo-born animal who awakes one morning to find the door to his cage hanging quietly open and the savannah stretching grey and pink to the distant rising sun, while all around new sounds are waking.
He wondered what the new sounds were as he gazed at her openly wondering face and her eyes that smiled with a shared surprise.
He hadn't realized that life speaks with a voice to you, a voice that brings you answers to the questions you continually ask of it, had never consciously detected it or recognized its tones till it now said something it had never said to him before, which was "Yes"."
And those were our readings. =)
Ellie
July 2nd, 2008 · 8:48 AM · #
My personal favorite love poem has always been Jim Daniels's "You Bring Out the Boring White Guy in Me."
Molly
July 2nd, 2008 · 10:31 AM · #
Thanks, Ariel!
This is just what I needed. When I started looking for an offbeat-but-meaningful reading for our ceremony, I went to wikiquote and looked up "marriage." Almost every one of the results were NEGATIVE! How frustrating.
Ok, I'm off to present the Madeleine L'Engal passage to dear fiance!
JessK
July 2nd, 2008 · 10:38 AM · #
If you're looking for something more secular that could cloak itself easily in a traditional ceremony, give Plato a once-over. My siblings-in-law used passages from Plato's "Symposium." It brought something different and unexpected to their otherwise traditional church wedding. It's the only thing I remember about the ceremony…that counts for something, right?
b.rodrigus
July 2nd, 2008 · 10:39 AM · #
I love that first one, I am going to have to hide it away for our rehearsal dinner.
Jennifer
July 2nd, 2008 · 11:33 AM · #
I didn't know that was L'Engle–I came across it as an option for opening words, so that is what we are using it for, although modified a little.
I also think that we're going to use that Magnetic Fields song for either the processional or the signing.
Kelly
July 2nd, 2008 · 11:36 AM · #
We used:
Reading # 1: Wedding Ritual (adapted from StarTrek: Celebrations by Maureen McTigue)
With fire and steel did the gods forge the man’s heart. So fiercely did it beat, so loud was the sound, that the gods cried out: “On this day we have brought forth the strongest heart in all the heavens. None can stand before it without trembling at its strength.” But then the man’s heart weakened, its steady rhythm faltered, and the gods said: “Why do you weaken so? We have made you the strongest in all of creation.” And the heart said…"I…am alone." And the gods knew that they had erred. So they went back to their forge and brought forth another heart. But the second heart beat stronger than the first, and the first was jealous of its power. Fortunately, the second heart was tempered by wisdom.
"If we join together, no forces can stop us." And when the two hearts began to beat together, they filled the heavens with a ferocious sound–and to this very day, no one can oppose the beating of these two hearts.
Reading #2: "A Picnic on the Earth" by Shuntaro Tanikawa
Let’s jump rope here, you and I. Right here!
Let’s have lunch here, you and I.
Here I will love you.
Your eyes will reflect the blue of the sky
And your back will be dyed the color of mugwort.
Let’s learn, you and I, the names of the constellations.
Here let us dream of things distant.
Here let’s gather shellfish.
Let’s pick a little starfish
From the sea of the dawning sky.
At breakfast let’s throw it back
And let the night recede.
Here I’ll go on saying “I’m home!”
While you keep saying, “Welcome back!”
I’ll come back here again and again.
Here let’s drink hot tea.
Let’s sit here, you and I, and be caressed for a while
By the cool breeze.
DQ
July 2nd, 2008 · 4:20 PM · #
I have friends who used http://www.amazon.com/Oh-Places-Youll-Classic-Seuss/dp/0679805273/offbeatbride-20" rel="nofollow">"The Places You'll Go" by Dr Seuess
Beth Stephen
July 2nd, 2008 · 7:27 PM · #
My favorite quote that I have had memorized forever:
To love very much is to love inadequately: We love- That is all. Love cannot be modified without being nullified. Love is a short word but it contains everything. Love means the body, the soul, the life, the entire being. We feel love as we feel the warmth of our blood, we breathe love as we breathe the air, we hold it in ourselves as we hold our thoughts. Nothing more exists for us. Love is not a word. It is a wordless state indicated by four letters.
Guy De Maupassant
Liz
July 2nd, 2008 · 10:57 PM · #
Fantastic! I am madly taking notes as we speak. Now I just need to find more readers….
Moonspun
July 3rd, 2008 · 5:51 AM · #
I just got married on June 21 and these are the two readings we used. Though I LOVE all the ones you posted.
The Journey
One day you finally knew
what you had to do, and began,
though the voices around you
kept shouting
their bad advice –
though the whole house
began to tremble
and you felt the old tug
at your ankles.
"Mend my life!"
each voice cried.
But you didn't stop.
You knew what you had to do,
though the wind pried
with its stiff fingers
at the very foundations,
though their melancholy
was terrible.
It was already late
enough, and a wild night,
and the road full of fallen
branches and stones.
But little by little,
as you left their voices behind,
the stars began to burn
through the sheets of clouds,
and there was a new voice
which you slowly
recognized as your own,
that kept you company
as you strode deeper and deeper
into the world,
determined to do
the only thing you could do –
determined to save
the only life you could save.
~ Mary Oliver ~
It's not as much about love, but in a second marriage, it was very appropriate!
Other one was:
Crusoe by George Bilgere
When you’ve been away from it long enough
You begin to forget the country
Of couples, with all its customs
And mysterious ways. Those two
Over there, for instance: late thirties,
Attractive and well-dressed, reading
At the table, drinking some complicated
Coffee drink. They haven’t spoken
Or even looked at each other in thirty minutes
But the big toe of her right foot, naked
In its sandal, sometimes grazes
The naked ankle bone of his left foot,
The faintest signal, a line thrown
Between two vessels as they cruise
Through this hour, this vacation, this life,
Through the thick novels they’re reading,
Her toe saying to his ankle,
Here’s to the whole improbable story
Of our meeting, of our life together
And the oceanic richness
Of our mingled narrative
With its complex past, with its hurts
And secret jokes, its dark closets
And delightful sexual quirks,
Its occasional doldrums, its vast
Future we have already peopled
With children. How safe we are
Compared to that man sitting across the room,
Marooned with his drink
And yellow notebook, trying to write
A way off his little island.
Becky
July 3rd, 2008 · 1:52 PM · #
The reading I love that we will use somehow at our ceremony is this one:
Loving the wrong person
We’re all seeking that special person who is right for us, but if you’ve been through enough relationships, you begin to suspect there’s no right person, just different flavors of wrong. Why is this? Because you yourself are wrong in some way, and you seek out partners who are wrong in some complementary way. But it takes a lot of living to grow fully into your own wrongness. It isn’t until you finally run up against your deepest demons, your unsolvable problems – the ones that make you truly who you are – that you’re ready to find a life-long mate. You’re looking for the wrong person. But not just any wrong person: the right wrong person – someone you lovingly gaze upon and think, “This is the problem I want to have.” – Andrew Boyd, Daily Afflictions.
Michelle
July 3rd, 2008 · 2:19 PM · #
I am planning on playing this song or reading the lyrics…
Dreaming my Dreams
The Cranberries
All the things you said to me today
Changed my perspective in every way
These things count to mean so much to me
Into my faith you
and your baby
It's out there
If you want me
I'll be here
It's out there
I'll be dreaming my dreams with you
And there's no other place
that I'd lay down my face
I'll be dreaming my dreams with you
It's out there
If you want me, I'll be here
I'll be dreaming my dreams with you
And there's no other place
that I'd lay down my face
I'll be dreaming my dreams with you
M
July 4th, 2008 · 8:46 PM · #
Other Lives and Dimensions and Finally a Love Poem, by Bill Hicok
My left hand will live longer than my right. The rivers
of my palms tell me so.
Never argue with rivers. Never expect your lives to finish
at the same time. I think
praying, I think clapping is how hands mourn. I think
staying up and waiting
for paintings to sigh is science. In another dimension this
is exactly what's happening,
it's what they write grants about: the chromodynamics
of mournful Whistlers,
the audible sorrow and beta decay of "Old Battersea Bridge."
I like the idea of different
theres and elsewheres, an Idaho known for bluegrass,
a Bronx where people talk
like violets smell. Perhaps I am somewhere patient, somehow
kind, perhaps in the nook
of a cousin universe I've never defiled or betrayed
anyone. Here I have
two hands and they are vanishing, the hollow of your back
to rest my cheek against,
your voice and little else but my assiduous fear to cherish.
My hands are webbed
like the wind-torn work of a spider, like they squeezed
something in the womb
but couldn't hang on. One of those other worlds
or a life I felt
passing through mine, or the ocean inside my mother's belly
she had to scream out.
Here when I say "I never want to be without you,"
somewhere else I am saying
"I never want to be without you again." And when I touch you
in each of the places we meet
in all of the lives we are, it's with hands that are dying
and resurrected.
When I don't touch you it's a mistake in any life,
in each place and forever.
Sandy
July 7th, 2008 · 7:12 AM · #
Whee!
Our first dance was 'Book of Love' by the Magnetic Fields!
Chase
July 12th, 2008 · 12:05 PM · #
We used the Roy Croft one for our wedding last month. We did it as part of our vows, though, each of us reading a line of the poem to each other and then adding our self-written vows at the end. (We hated the idea of repeating after the minister.)
Everyone loved it. So did we. It was perfect for us.
princess lasertron
July 16th, 2008 · 9:04 PM · #
We didn't have this as a reading–I actually incorporated it into my vows–but it would make a REALLY nice reading. From the book "I like you" by Sandol Stoddard:
I like you
And I know why
I like you because
You are a good person
To like
I like you because
When I tell you something special
You know it's special
And you remember it
A long long time
You say
Remember when you told me
Something special
And both of us remember
When I think something is important
You think it's important too
When I say something funny
You laugh
I think I'm funny and
You think I'm funny too
I like you because
You know where I'm ticklish
And you don't tickle me there
except
Just a little tiny bit
sometimes
But if you do then I know where to tickle you too
You know how to be silly
That's why I like you
Boy are you ever silly
I never met anybody sillier than me
till I met you
I like you because
You know when it's time to stop being silly
Maybe day after tomorrow
Maybe never
Oops too late
It's quarter post silly
We fool around the same way all the time
Sometimes we don't say a word
We snurkle under fences
We spy secret places
If I am a goofus on the roofus
Hollering my head off
You are one too
If I pretend I am drowning
You pretend you are saving me
If I am getting ready to pop a paper bag
Then you are getting to jump
That's because
You really like me
You really like me
Don't you
And I really like you back
And you like me back
And I like you back
And that's the way we keep on going
Every day
If you go away
then I go away too
Or if I stay home
You send me a postcard
You don't just say
Well see you around
Some time
Bye
I like you a lot
because of that
If I go away
I send you a postcard too
And I like you because
If we go away together
And if we are in Grand Central Station
And if I get lost
then you are the one that is yelling for me
Hey where are you
Here I am
And I like you because
When I am feeling sad
You don't always cheer me up right away
Sometimes it is better to be sad
You can't stand the others being so googly and gaggly
every single minute
You want to think about things
It takes time
I like you because if I am mad at you
Then you are mad at me too
It's awful when the other person isn't
They are so nice and hoo-hoo you could just about
punch them in the nose
I like you because if I think I am going to
throw up then you are really sorry
You don't just pretend you are busy looking at
the birdies and all that
You say maybe it was something you ate
You say same thing happened to me one time
And the same thing did
If you find two four-leaf clovers
You give me one
If I find four
I give you two
If we only find three
We keep on looking
Sometimes we have good luck
And sometimes we don't
If I break my arm and
If you bread your arm too
Then it is fun to have a broken arm
I tell you about mine
You tell me about yours
We are both sorry
We write our names and draw pictures
We show everybody and they wish they had a broken arm too
I like you because
I don't know why but
Everything that happens
Is nicer with you
I can't remember when I didn't like you
It must have been lonesome then
I like you because because
I forget why I like you
But I do
So many reasons
On the Fourth of July I like you because
It's the Fourth of July
On the Fifth of July
I like you too
If you and I had some drums
And some horns and some horses
If we had some hats and some
Flags and some fire-engines
We could be a HOLIDAY
We could be a CELEBRATION
We could be a WHOLE PARADE
See what I mean?
Even if it was the
nine-hundred-and-ninety-ninth of July
Even if it was August
Even if it was way down at the bottom of November
Even if it was no place particular in January
I would go on choosing you
And you would go on choosing me
Over and over again
That's how it would happen every time
I don't know why
I guess I don't know why I like you really
Why do I like you
I guess I just like you
I guess I just like you
Because I like you
[sorry that was hella long]
Kirsty Ware
July 22nd, 2008 · 8:39 AM · #
our wedding was themed to edward monkton's lovely love story, and that was our reading.
The fierce Dinosaur was trapped inside his cage of ice. Although it was cold he was happy in there. It was, after all, HIS cage.
Then along came the Lovely Other Dinosaur.
The Lovely Other Dinosaur melted the Dinosaur's cage with kind words and loving thoughts.
I like this Dionsaur, thought the Lovely Other Dinosaur. Although he is fierce he is also tender and he is funny. He is also quite clever though I will not tell him this for now.
I like this Lovely Other Dinosaur, thought the Dinosaur. She is beautiful and she is different and she smells so nice. She is also a free spirit which is a quality I much admire in a dinosaur.
But he can be so distant and so peculiar at times, thought the Lovely Other Dinosaur.
He is also overly fond of Things. Are all Dinosaurs so overly fond of Things?
But her mind skips from here to there so quickly, thought the Dinosaur. She is also uncommonly keen on Shopping. Are all Lovely Other Dinosaurs so uncommonly keen on shopping?
I will forgive his peculiarity and his concern for Things, thought the Lovely Other Dinosaur. For they are part of what makes him a richly charactered individual.
I will forgive her skipping mind and her fondness for shopping, thought the Dinosaur. For she fills our life with beautiful thought and wonderful surprises. Besides, I am not unkeen on shopping either.
Now the Dinosaur and the Lovely Other Dinosaur are old. Look at them.
Together they stand on the hill telling each other stories and feeling the warmth of the sun on their backs.
And that, my frends, is how it is with love. Let us all be Dinosaurs and Lovely Other Dinosaurs together.
For the sun is warm. And the world is a beautiful place.
kristin @ the fairmount bride
July 24th, 2008 · 1:00 PM · #
thank you for posting these!
Charles
September 23rd, 2008 · 7:52 PM · #
Thanks for posting this site. My son has asked me to speak at his wedding, and there are some great resources here . . . Nothing corny, just great poems and passages.
Stephanie
October 13th, 2008 · 4:26 AM · #
With so many great ones, I thought to possibly add another.
BTW: LOVE (!) 'I think I like you' Sounds just like me rambling on. I'm so glad to be reminded why we're having this wedding to begin with.
OK, here's mine. It's from the song 'Love Rain Down On Me' by Jill Scott featuring Mos Def. I took Mos Def's part and changed part of it. Other than obvious he/she differences what I changed is in parentatheses.
Love rain down on me
X3
I stretch my arms towards the sky like blades of tall grass
A rhythm bounces between my shoulders like carnival jumps
I sat still in hopes it would help my wings grow
So then I’d really be fly
And then she arrived
Like daybreak inside a railway tunnel, like the new moon, like a diamond in the mines
Like high noon to a drunkard, sudden
She made my heart beat in a now-now time signature
Her skinny canvas were ultraviolet brush strokes
She was the suns painting; she was a deep cognac color
(Straight from the sniffer of God’s brandy)
Her (My) eyes sparkled like lights along the new city
(Only when reflected in your beauty ocean)
Her lips pursed as if her breath was too sweet and full for her mouth to hold
(My lips are pursed waiting for your sweet breath to fill my mouth)
I said, you are the beautiful distress of mathematics (that I never took the time to learn)
I said, for you I will peel open the clouds like new fruit
Give you lightning and thunder as (well as myself) a dowry
I will make the sky shit (pour) all of its stars like rain
And I will clasp the constellations across your waist (shoulders)
(To ease your load of the world)
(And when you return to me at night)
And I will make the heavens your (a) quilt
(Draped over the bed that we will share)
And they will be pleased to cover you (as they twinkle and shine)
They will be pleased to cover you (lover of mine)
(They will be pleased)
May I please, cover you
Please, (love you)
citrus
October 21st, 2008 · 6:49 PM · #
don't forget depeche mode.
I want somebody to share
Share the rest of my life
Share my innermost thoughts
Know my intimate details
Someone wholl stand by my side
And give me support
And in return
Shell get my support
She will listen to me
When I want to speak
About the world we live in
And life in general
Though my views may be wrong
They may even be perverted
Shell hear me out
And wont easily be converted
To my way of thinking
In fact shell often disagree
But at the end of it all
She will understand me
I want somebody who cares
For me passionately
With every thought and
With every breath
Someone wholl help me see things
In a different light
All the things I detest
I will almost like
I dont want to be tied
To anyones strings
Im carefully trying to steer clear of
Those things
But when Im asleep
I want somebody
Who will put their arms around me
And kiss me tenderly
Though things like this
Make me sick
In a case like this
Ill get away with it
Jessica
November 3rd, 2008 · 9:59 AM · #
Anyone have any ideas about a reading for a wedding ceremony from an ancient greek or roman myth? Something from Ovid or someone else in that vein? Thanks!
erin kelly
November 8th, 2008 · 9:43 PM · #
i just wanted to say i had "the invitation" hanging in my house for years and when it came time to choose something to read at my cousins wedding, nothing seemed more appropriate or supportive. now that i am getting married, i am a bit unsettled that i didnt hold onto this reading for myself! these are true words that will never disappoint…
Anne
November 15th, 2008 · 10:40 PM · #
From Marge Piercy's book, "The Art of Blessing the Day"
======================
The day I forget to write
the day I forget to feed the cats
the day I forget to love you
the day I forget your name
and then my own.
Until then I will not cease
this spinning pattern: part weave
of skeins of soft wool to keep
us warm, to clothe our too open
flesh, to decorate us –
and part dance, through woods
where roots trip me, a dance
through meadows of rabbit holes
and old ribs of plowing hidden
under thick grass.
Until then I will whirl
through my ragged days.
Like a spindle, like a dreydl
I will turn in the center
of my intricate weave
spelling your name in my dance
in my weaving, in my work,
your hidden name which
is simply, finally,
love.
===============
This poem is called "All lovers have secret names"
Alana
November 23rd, 2008 · 8:18 PM · #
Our wedding isn't for six months (from today, actually!), but we've already written our ceremony. We chose a range of readings, but my favorite is from the movie 'Serenity' when two of our favorite Joss Whedon characters are talking:
Capt. Malcolm Reynolds- It ain't all buttons and charts, little albatross. You know what the first rule of flying is? Well I suppose you do, since you already know what I'm about to say.
River Tam- I do. But I like to hear you say it.
Capt. Malcolm Reynolds- Love. You can know all the math in the 'Verse, but take a boat in the air you don't love, she'll shake you off just as sure as the turning of the world. Love keeps her in the air when she oughta fall down, tells ya she's hurtin' 'fore she keens. Makes her a home.
“I suffered through poetry in high school. Why would I want a poem at my wedding?” « Wordarrangement’s Blog
November 28th, 2008 · 3:59 AM · #
[...] http://offbeatbride.com/2008/07/wedding-readings#more-859 [...]
Our friends « Wordarrangement’s Blog
November 28th, 2008 · 4:21 AM · #
[...] http://offbeatbride.com/2008/07/wedding-readings#more-859 [...]
Rachel
December 1st, 2008 · 5:50 PM · #
There are so many beautiful readings here.
One that seems very obvious to me is The Cure's Lovesong:
Whenever i'm alone with you
You make me feel like i am home again
Whenever i'm alone with you
You make me feel like i am whole again
Whenever i'm alone with you
You make me feel like i am young again
Whenever i'm alone with you
You make me feel like i am fun again
How ever far away, i will always love you
How ever long i stay, i will always love you
Whatever words i say, i will always love you
I will always love you
Quietly into the night…
Whenever i'm alone with you
You make me feel like i am free again
Whenever i'm alone with you
You make me feel like i am clean again
However far away,i will always love you
How ever long i stay, i will always love you
What ever words i say, i will always love you
I will always love you
Jen
December 8th, 2008 · 6:50 PM · #
We are definitely thinking of having The Cure's Lovesong.
We are also having a bit more of a funny reading. The lyrics from The Two Of Us by The Mr T Experience:
Now there are two of us, instead of only one,
two times as many things get left half undone.
We're twice as half-asleep when the new day has begun
and maybe twice as on the run,
'cause some of them will still be making fun of us.
They'll say the two of you will never be one of us.
But even if that's true,
they'll have twice as much to do
when there are two of us,
and one of them is you.
They'll find the two of us much harder to restrain,
outsmarted by our impressive double brain
If one of us runs dry, still another will remain,
and it's twice as hard to pull the chain
of two of us, against a ton of them:
but two of us outnumber every single one of them.
Two lives are semi-rough
with half the rent and twice the stuff.
There are two of us, and that should be enough.
Look at everybody.
Everybody's always
falling apart or breaking up.
But the two of us never will be one of those,
and I should know– I have had a run of those
Our love's not guaranteed,
but it's growing like a weed.
There are two of us,
I think that's all we need.
the2monkeys
December 8th, 2008 · 8:54 PM · #
We went for "The Power of Love" by Huey Lewis and the News…
Adrien-Alice
December 16th, 2008 · 1:55 PM · #
Sometimes I think I've been planning my readings my whole life the way other folks plan the tulle, funky reception ideas or number of kids (I mean, depending on the person). Anyhow, here's one I love.
Tony Kushner, from “An Epithalamion”
2.
Encircled by this breathing world
within this close sphere of warm summer night
ringed by this congress of friends here assembled
we make declaration of our love and our union
in public declaring what’s privately ours.
From this crowd of hearts, shared heat and blood.
3.
I am yours, who I love, not a dream by life, not fantasy,
immortality, eternity, but the present moment and all-too-
mortal flesh; to what is hardest; love is hardest; hard and
simple and what is best in life.
Love care honor growth—fine simple things and I make a
vow of them to you.
I too vow these to you who I also love and also to the
careful protecting and preserving of dreams. Circle within
circle, concentrically guarded, in the pliable element of
the innermost heart, a garden blossoms in a golden ring;
the dream of dawn in paradise shines there. Love is
imagination’s spur and food.
I promise you a future, impossible things, Justice and freedom
and life without loss,
a practical pillow, a home, in fact, a sheltering and withstanding
spirit and always a room for your dreaming.
4.
Light is the Wedding of Matter and Spirit,
wave and particle, it is neither and both,
and is in itself the blood of creation.
It floods across galaxies and has no end,
it describes and transforms with a single motion.
May our love be as light.
VI. And Then…
Together, old and content,
the day is warm and nearly over, the first breeze of
evening
plays in your hair. The sun sinks behind us,
silhouetting the city.
An old hand is ringing down the curtain.
We cross the bridge that goes east
into night.
Margy
December 19th, 2008 · 11:02 PM · #
I love the ancient Greek story about soulmates. Basically, the gods created humans to have two heads, four arms, and four legs, but one heart. All people were truly happy, and the gods became jealous, so they split every human so that they only had one head, two arms, two legs, and half a heart. We are destined to find our other half, or soulmate, to become complete again.
The actual wording of the myth is beautiful (I butchered it just now).
Another myth I particularily love is Eros and Psyche. Basically, Eros represents the physical, and Psyche the mind. For true love to exist, there needs to be both.
I love the statue of eros and psyche with his wings all flung out, and her in his arms <3 !!!
Margy
December 19th, 2008 · 11:05 PM · #
If you are looking for particularily unique love poems, you might also try a metaphysical poet. They have this amazing way of comparing things so obscurely, but making it sound SO RIGHT.
Eg- in "Valediction of Forbidden Mourning," John Donne compares his love to the foot of a compass (drawing tool), and himself to the wandering end. No mater how far he goes (the poem is about him leaving on a long journey), her foot brings him in a full circle, and make him end where he began.
LOVE IT!
Kate
January 2nd, 2009 · 5:44 AM · #
We had the Sandol Stoddard one at our wedding. It was awesome. My friend is an actor and he read it brilliantly.
We also had these:
"All I Ever Really Needed to Know
I Learned in Kindergarten"
Robert Fulgham
"All of what I really need to know about how to live, and what to do, and how to be, I learned in Kindergarten. Wisdom was not at the top of the graduate school mountain, but there in the sandbox at nursery school.
These are the things I learned..
Share everything.
Play fair.
Don't hit people.
Put things back where you found them.
Clean up your own mess.
Don't take things that aren't yours.
Say sorry when you hurt somebody.
Wash your hands before you eat.
Flush.
Warm cookies and cold milk are good for you. Give them to someone who feels sad.
Live a balanced life.
Learn some and think some and draw and paint and sing and dance and play and work every day.
Take a nap every afternoon.
Be aware of wonder.
Remember the little seed in the plastic cup? The roots go down and the plant goes up and nobody really knows how or why, but we are all like that.
Everything you need to know is in there somewhere.
And it is still true, no matter how old you are, when you go out into the world, it is best to hold hands and stick together."
and this:
“When we find someone
Whose weirdness
Is compatible with ours
We join up with them
And fall into
Mutually satisfying weirdness
That is called
True love”
We also had this printed on the first page of our orders of service:
“This guy is walking down the street, when he falls in a hole. The walls are so steep he can't get out.
A doctor passes by and the guy shouts up,
'Hey, you, can you help me out? I'm in a hole here'.
The doctor writes out a prescription, throws it into the hole and moves on.
A priest walks past. The guy calls out,
'Father, I'm down in this hole can you help me out?'.
The priest writes out a prayer, throws it down in the hole and moves on.
Then a friend walks by. The guy shouts up,
'Hey, it's me, can you help me out?'
The friend jumps into the hole.
Our guy says,
'Are you stupid, now we're both down here?'
The friend says,
'Yeah, but I've been down here before and I know the way out'.”
Leo McGarry – The West Wing
Sarah
January 4th, 2009 · 8:11 PM · #
Writer Dan Savage explaining marriage to his 6-year-old son:
(From act II of the This American Life Episode “A Little Bit of Knowledge” — It's a great story about how Dan and his boyfriend explain marriage and gay marriage to their son.)
"There's something in your heart that makes you go out into the world and find someone new, someone you've met before, and that's the person you fall in love with."
“Why?”
“Because that's how new families are made and someday you'll meet the person you want to make a new family with and that's the person you're supposed to marry.”
“Why?”
“Because marriage is a promise that you make to that other person, a promise to stay in love with them forever, to be related forever, and that you'll always be together.”
I'm not sure if/how I'll use this for my wedding, but it's my favorite definition of marriage so far.
Karena Jane
January 7th, 2009 · 12:07 PM · #
One of my favorite readings is a hilarious and sentimental poem by Ogden Nash, "Tin Wedding Whistle". I first heard it at one of the first weddings I photographed — a Scottish groom and a Jewish bride under a chuppah made of cornstalks on the family farm. Very OBB long before OBB existed…I'm sure she would have fit right in here! Anyway, it is as follows:
Tin Wedding Whistle
Ogden Nash
Though you know it anyhow
Listen to me, darling, now,
Proving what I need not prove
How I know I love you, love.
Near and far, near and far,
I am happy where you are;
Likewise I have never larnt
How to be it where you aren't.
Far and wide, far and wide,
I can walk with you beside;
Furthermore, I tell you what,
I sit and sulk where you are not.
Visitors remark my frown
Where you're upstairs and I am down,
Yes, and I'm afraid I pout
When I'm indoors and you are out;
But how contentedly I view
Any room containing you.
In fact I care not where you be,
Just as long as it's with me.
In all your absences I glimpse
Fire and flood and trolls and imps.
Is your train a minute slothful?
I goad the stationmaster wrothful.
When with friends to bridge you drive
I never know if you're alive,
And when you linger late in shops
I long to telephone the cops.
Yet how worth the waiting for,
To see you coming through the door.
Somehow, I can be complacent
Never but with you adjacent.
Near and far, near and far,
I am happy where you are;
Likewise I have never larnt
How to be it where you aren't.
Then grudge me not my fond endeavor,
To hold you in my sight forever;
Let none, not even you, disparage
Such a valid reason for a marriage.
Alex
January 9th, 2009 · 7:50 AM · #
There are some really beautiful readings on here, so many I'd love to use but feel slightly hypocritical as this is my partner's second marriage so all the 'marriage is forever' stuff doesn't really ring true.
Anyone got any ideas?
Pearbaby
January 9th, 2009 · 12:14 PM · #
BLESSING FOR A MARRIAGE
~ James Dillet Freeman ~
May your marriage bring you all the exquisite excitements a marriage should bring, and may life grant you also patience, tolerance, and understanding.
May you always need one another – not so much to fill your emptiness as to help you to know your fullness. A mountain needs a valley to be complete; the valley does not make the mountain less, but more; and the valley is more a valley because it has a mountain towering over it. So let it be with you and you.
May you need one another, but not out of weakness.
May you want one another, but not out of lack.
May you entice one another, but not compel one another.
May you embrace one another, but not out encircle one another.
May you succeed in all important ways with one another, and not fail in the little graces.
May you look for things to praise, often say, "I love you!" and take no notice of small faults.
If you have quarrels that push you apart, may both of you hope to have good sense enough to take the first step back.
May you enter into the mystery which is the awareness of one another's presence – no more physical than spiritual, warm and near when you are side by side, and warm and near when you are in separate rooms or even distant cities.
May you have happiness, and may you find it making one another happy.
May you have love, and may you find it loving one another.
Katie
January 11th, 2009 · 6:20 PM · #
This one is from the Velveteen Rabbit
a link to the full online text http://digital.library.upenn.edu/women/williams/rabbit/rabbit.html
I think we edited it down a bit from this though it seems really long now that I look at it again, and my whole ceremony was 15 minutes. No need to make people sit quietly in chairs for hours when really they want to hang out and have fun.
——-
For a long time he lived in the toy cupboard or on the nursery floor, and no one thought very much about him. He was naturally shy, and being only made of velveteen, some of the more expensive toys quite snubbed him. The mechanical toys were very superior, and looked down upon every one else; they were full of modern ideas, and pretended they were real. The model boat, who had lived through two seasons and lost most of his paint, caught the tone from them and never missed an opportunity of referring to his rigging in technical terms. The Rabbit could not claim to be a model of anything, for he didn't know that real rabbits existed; he thought they were all stuffed with sawdust like himself, and he understood that sawdust was quite out-of-date and should never be mentioned in modern circles. Even Timothy, the jointed wooden lion, who was made by the disabled soldiers, and should have had broader views, put on airs and pretended he was connected with Government. Between them all the poor little Rabbit was made to feel himself very insignificant and commonplace, and the only person who was kind to him at all was the Skin Horse.
The Skin Horse had lived longer in the nursery than any of the others. He was so old that his brown coat was bald in patches and showed the seams underneath, and most of the hairs in his tail had been pulled out to string bead necklaces. He was wise, for he had seen a long succession of mechanical toys arrive to boast and swagger, and by-and-by break their mainsprings and pass away, and he knew that they were only toys, and would never turn into anything else. For nursery magic is very strange and wonderful, and only those playthings that are old and wise and experienced like the Skin Horse understand all about it.
"What is REAL?" asked the Rabbit one day, when they were lying side by side near the nursery fender, before Nana came to tidy the room. "Does it mean having things that buzz inside you and a stick-out handle?"
"Real isn't how you are made," said the Skin Horse. "It's a thing that happens to you. When a child loves you for a long, long time, not just to play with, but REALLY loves you, then you become Real."
"Does it hurt?" asked the Rabbit.
"Sometimes," said the Skin Horse, for he was always truthful. "When you are Real you don't mind being hurt."
"Does it happen all at once, like being wound up," he asked, "or bit by bit?"
"It doesn't happen all at once," said the Skin Horse. "You become. It takes a long time. That's why it doesn't happen often to people who break easily, or have sharp edges, or who have to be carefully kept. Generally, by the time you are Real, most of your hair has been loved off, and your eyes drop out and you get loose in the joints and very shabby. But these things don't matter at all, because once you are Real you can't be ugly, except to people who don't understand."
Katie
January 11th, 2009 · 6:56 PM · #
Oh and some family members who are definitely off beat did a reading of the Owl and the Pussy Cat by Edward Lear. A lot of the vernacular from this childrens poem has changed meaning over time, making it a "safe" yet utterly envelope pushing depending on HOW it is read.
http://www.nonsenselit.org/Lear/ns/pussy.html
Mouse
January 16th, 2009 · 8:23 PM · #
Love the MTX song. I'm not sure how we're going to use it but The Groovie Ghoulies will be part of our wedding for sure. My boy sang this song to me when we first got together and I was down about him going back to base.
Till Death Do Us Party:
Here's how it is, I know the score, don't count on anything for sure.
Leave no regrets, and waste no time.
What's mine is yours and yours is mine.
'Til death do us party, let us make a pact.
No one will come between us, no one will turn us back.
No one will get in our way, no one will bring us down.
No one will make us feel like we're not worthy of the crown.
I look at things surrounding me, and I like everything I see.
If it was gone, I wouldn't care, when I look over you're right there.
'Til death do us party.
1-2-3-5 No one here gets out alive!
6-7-9-10 Re-incarnate, do it again!
Pat
January 28th, 2009 · 10:28 PM · #
And hand in hand,
by the edge of the sand,
they danced by the light of the moon,
the moon,
they danced by the light of the moon
Amen. I love The Owl and the Pussycat and was wondering how to incoorporate it into the wedding. I made us a picture book once where I was the pusscat and he was the owl (his totem animal). I really want to repeat the theme.
Angela
March 26th, 2009 · 12:52 AM · #
ZOMG!!! I was looking for a reading for our wedding and have to thank Jess for posting the one taken from the Massachusetts Supreme Court. My partner and I have decided to get married in Mass even though our license won't be valid in our home state of Florida. This makes it bittersweet for us, but just the thought that for the short time we are there, we will have the same rights as our friends, family, neighbors and coworkers have is too much for us to refuse the opportunity.
Jamili
April 10th, 2009 · 8:36 PM · #
How appropriate for the kindergarten teacher krowd…or, conversely, the Wall Street set just itching to shed their stodgy shell and fingerpaint for a living:
The Gorilla Song, by Raffi
One, two,
A one two kazoo
If I were a gorilla,
la la la la la
I'd eat me a banana.
na na na na na
I'd live in a treehouse
And swing on a vine,
But one thing is sure:
I would love ya,
Yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah,
Yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah.
And if I were a tuba,
ba ba ba ba ba
All I'd do is oompah.
pah pah pah pah pah
I would take a big breath,
And I would march in a band,
But one thing is sure:
I would love ya,
Yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah,
Yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah.
'Cause it don't matter to me-
Whatever you happen to be;
An eagle,
An onion,
A pig or a grape,
As long as you're you,
I will love ya.
Yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah,
Yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah.
And if I were a space ship,
ip ip ip ip ip
I would take a long trip.
rip rip rip rip rip
I would circle the planets
And head for the stars,
And then I'd come home,
'Cause I love ya.
Yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah,
Yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah.
And if I were a daisy,
sy sy sy sy sy
Would you still be my baby?
by by by by by
I would pull all my petals out,
One at a time,
And always come up with
I love ya
Yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah,
Yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah.
'Cause it don't matter to me-
Whatever you happen to be;
A beagle,
A grunion,
A fig or an ape,
As long as you're you,
I'll still love ya.
Yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah,
Yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah.
Ba-bum-bump.
links for 2009-04-13 « Embololalia
April 13th, 2009 · 11:04 AM · #
[...] Offbeat Bride | Awesome wedding readings for bad-ass couples incl To Love is Not to Possess – James Kavanaugh, Rilke, Rumi, Adrienne Rich (tags: poetry music relationships) [...]
Shannon
April 15th, 2009 · 8:49 AM · #
This September I'm getting married and the first song will probablt be "If it's the Beaches" by the Avett Brothers. Here is an excerpt from it.
"If it's the beaches
If it's the beaches' sands you want
Then you will have them
If it's the mountains' bending rivers
Then you will have them
If it's the wish to run away
Then I will grant it
Take whatever what you think of
While I go gas up the truck
Pack the old love letters up
We will read them when we forget why we left here"
Eclectic Wedding Readings « Eclectic Unions - Unique Wedding Ceremonies by Celebrant Jessie Blum - Serving New Jersey
April 20th, 2009 · 10:46 AM · #
[...] go to wedding reading depositories are this Offbeat Bride post and this thread on Indie Bride. They both take a little bit of digging, but it's worth [...]
Sarah
April 27th, 2009 · 10:08 PM · #
I did a reading at a friend's wedding recently – Us Two, by A.A. Milne. I thought it was a gorgeous choice, though I did get a wee bit teary!
Us Two
Wherever I am, there's always Pooh,
There's always Pooh and Me.
Whatever I do, he wants to do,
"Where are you going today?" says Pooh:
"Well, that's very odd 'cos I was too.
Let's go together," says Pooh, says he.
"Let's go together," says Pooh.
"What's twice eleven?" I said to Pooh.
("Twice what?" said Pooh to Me.)
"I think it ought to be twenty-two."
"Just what I think myself," said Pooh.
"It wasn't an easy sum to do,
But that's what it is," said Pooh, said he.
"That's what it is," said Pooh.
"Let's look for dragons," I said to Pooh.
"Yes, let's," said Pooh to Me.
We crossed the river and found a few-
"Yes, those are dragons all right," said Pooh.
"As soon as I saw their beaks I knew.
That's what they are," said Pooh, said he.
"That's what they are," said Pooh.
"Let's frighten the dragons," I said to Pooh.
"That's right," said Pooh to Me.
"I'm not afraid," I said to Pooh,
And I held his paw and I shouted "Shoo!
Silly old dragons!"- and off they flew.
"I wasn't afraid," said Pooh, said he,
"I'm never afraid with you."
So wherever I am, there's always Pooh,
There's always Pooh and Me.
"What would I do?" I said to Pooh,
"If it wasn't for you," and Pooh said: "True,
It isn't much fun for One, but Two,
Can stick together, says Pooh, says he. "That's how it is," says Pooh.
Triana Orpheus
May 16th, 2009 · 5:08 AM · #
This may sound a little silly, but can anyone think of a Harry Potter reading?
Nicole
May 16th, 2009 · 10:11 PM · #
We'll use these lines somewhere in our ceremony in three months (probably somewhere in our vows, and then printed in the program as well):
"i would not wish
Any companion in the world but you."
-Shakespeare, "The Tempest"
Perfect, simple, lovely.
Rebecca
May 20th, 2009 · 10:06 PM · #
After much searching, we finally found a sweet, non-pretentious and child-like reading for our personalized wedding. Perfect for all dog-lovers. p.s. an epithalamion is a poem written for a bride on her wedding day.
Falling in Love is Like Owning a Dog
An Epithalamion by Taylor Mali
First of all, it's a big responsibility,
especially in a city like Washington, DC.
So think long and hard before deciding on love.
On the other hand, love gives you a sense of security:
when you're walking down the street late at night
and you have a leash on love
ain't no one gonna mess with you.
Love doesn't like being left alone for long.
But come home and love is always happy to see you.
It may break a few things accidentally in its passion for life,
but you can never be mad at love for long.
Is love good all the time? No! No!
Love can be bad. Bad, love, bad! Very bad love.
Sometimes love just wants to go for a nice long walk.
It runs you around the block and leaves you panting.
It pulls you in several different directions at once,
or winds around and around you
until you're all wound up and can't move.
But love makes you meet people wherever you go.
People who have nothing in common but love
stop and talk to each other on the street.
Throw things away and love will bring them back
again, and again, and again.
But most of all, love needs love, lots of it.
And in return, love loves you and never stops.
Kate
May 23rd, 2009 · 9:56 AM · #
I really like a lot of the passages that everyone posted, although for the most part I'm not really feelin them for ceremony readings – instead, I'm going to use the ones I like in a book of poetry that I've been wanting to make as a gift for my fiance for a while now. Thanks for the great ideas everyone!
Mary
May 25th, 2009 · 10:18 PM · #
My favorite is a piece of slam poetry by Taylor Mali. It's called "Falling in love is like owning a dog."
First of all, it's a big responsibility,
especially in a city like New York.
So think long and hard before deciding on love.
On the other hand, love gives you a sense of security:
when you're walking down the street late at night
and you have a leash on love
ain't no one going to mess with you.
Because crooks and muggers think love is unpredictable.
Who knows what love could do in its own defense?
On cold winter nights, love is warm.
It lies between you and lives and breathes
and makes funny noises.
Love wakes you up all hours of the night with its needs.
It needs to be fed so it will grow and stay healthy.
Love doesn't like being left alone for long.
But come home and love is always happy to see you.
It may break a few things accidentally in its passion for life,
but you can never be mad at love for long.
Is love good all the time? No! No!
Love can be bad. Bad, love, bad! Very bad love.
Love makes messes.
Love leaves you little surprises here and there.
Love needs lots of cleaning up after.
Sometimes you just want to get love fixed.
Sometimes you want to roll up a piece of newspaper
and swat love on the nose,
not so much to cause pain,
just to let love know Don't you ever do that again!
Sometimes love just wants to go for a nice long walk.
Because love loves exercise.
It runs you around the block and leaves you panting.
It pulls you in several different directions at once,
or winds around and around you
until you're all wound up and can't move.
But love makes you meet people wherever you go.
People who have nothing in common but love
stop and talk to each other on the street.
Throw things away and love will bring them back,
again, and again, and again.
But most of all, love needs love, lots of it.
And in return, love loves you and never stops.
Kmackstress
June 3rd, 2009 · 9:14 AM · #
I fell in love with this poem working on a play of Wendell Berry poems. I nearly cried everytime the actors rehearsed it. It totally describes where we hope our future takes us.
We plan to have 2 people read it together, alternating sentences.
The Blue Robe
by Wendell Berry
How joyful to be together, alone
as when we first were joined
in our little house by the river
long ago, except that now we know
each other, as we did not then;
and now instead of two stories fumbling
to meet, we belong to one story
that the two, joining, made. And now
we touch each other with the tenderness
of mortals, who know themselves:
how joyful to feel the heart quake
at the sight of a grandmother,
old friend in the morning light,
beautiful in her blue robe!
Alexandra
June 4th, 2009 · 4:31 AM · #
I love the song "Anniversary" by Voltaire. Almost want it as a first song but afraid of it making me cry — it has done that before.
Do I look the same to you? 'Cause I don't feel so.
You know everything must change as time goes by.
Though it feels like yesterday when we first met.
I feel I'm sinking deeper.
Do you look the same to me? Well, I don't think so.
You know everything must change as time goes by.
Like the flowers that dry, locking inside
forever their beauty.
And they said this feeling fades,
it gets stronger everyday.
And they said that beauty fades.
You're more beautiful than ever.
They said we'd drift away,
we're still standing here.
And it feels like everyday is our anniversary.
Well, I stumble through the dark and light a candle
and the path the wax will take, no one can know.
And you said it looked like snow or maybe clouds,
and I think it looks like heaven.
So we make it into a ring and make a mold.
And we welt above the flames the whitest gold.
When hot and cold collide what's left in place
is forever and ever.
Some say things worth having take some time.
As they get older they get better
NataZing
June 19th, 2009 · 11:25 PM · #
there is one on indiebride.com…it is the description of the preparations for Fleur and Bill's wedding and it's darling
Ashley
July 5th, 2009 · 1:18 PM · #
We used this for our wedding…
Cat Heaven, by Jets to Brazil
In the dream that awakened me,
you had come and taken me to a sea of stars.
The cat stood in the flowers, two ears above.
And the ground that was under me
was holding me so wonderfully on a bed of leaves
and you were there with me and we were free.
Everything we saw was beautiful and strong
and I knew we belonged.
Then the birds came and carried us to the sky
and married us on a bed of stars
where I was always yours and you were mine.
And in the long black eternity
I loved you so perfectly in the words of clouds,
like a bird sings to his flowers
and I was heard.
Everything I saw was everything I'd want
and this world had just begun to live.
Kate
July 9th, 2009 · 8:35 AM · #
George Bilgere was my English prof!
katie
July 10th, 2009 · 6:23 AM · #
Thank you so much! I saw that a while ago when I was browsing one day and couldn't find it again. I love it.
klingklang
July 23rd, 2009 · 11:23 AM · #
Long time fan of John Cooper Clarke so ours is:
I Wanna Be Yours…
I wanna be your vacuum cleaner
breathing in your dust
I wanna be your Ford Cortina
I will never rust
If you like your coffee hot
let me be your coffee pot
You call the shots
I wanna be yours
I wanna be your raincoat
for those frequent rainy days
I wanna be your dreamboat
when you want to sail away
Let me be your teddy bear
take me with you anywhere
I don’t care
I wanna be yours
I wanna be your electric meter
I will not run out
I wanna be the electric heater
you’ll get cold without
I wanna be your setting lotion
hold your hair in deep devotion
Deep as the deep Atlantic ocean
that’s how deep is my devotion
Angela
August 9th, 2009 · 5:42 PM · #
My favorite is Shel Silverstein's "The Missing Piece Meets the Big O".
Some excerpts:
"It was missing a piece
And it was not happy
So it set off in search
of its missing piece"
""Hi!" It said.
"Hi!" said the piece
"Are you anybody else's missing piece?"
"Not that I know of."
"Well, maybe you want to be your own piece?"
"I can be someone's and still be my own."
"Well, Maybe you don't want to be mine."
"Maybe I do!"
"Maybe we won't fit…"
"Well…"
"Hummmmm?"
"Ummmmmm?"
It fit
It fit perfectly
At last! At last!"
Cheryl
August 11th, 2009 · 4:04 PM · #
Oh, this is our first dance song! And my fiance picked Book of Love for his reading which even though I love the song, I thought might not be quite appropriate. I feel a bit relieved that others have used it before us!
Sully
August 23rd, 2009 · 4:20 PM · #
I plan to use this as one of our readings, and still looking for a second.
“Union” by Robert Fulghum
You have known each other from the first glance of acquaintance to this point of commitment. At some point, you decided to marry. From that moment of yes to this moment of yes, indeed, you have been making promises and agreements in an informal way. All those conversations that were held riding in a car or over a meal or during long walks – all those sentences that began with "When we're married" and continued with "I will and you will and we will" – those late night talks that included "someday and somehow and maybe"- and all those promises that are unspoken matters of the heart. All these common things, and more, are the real process of a wedding. The symbolic vows that you are about to make are a way of saying to one another, "You know all those things we've promised and hoped and dreamed- well, I meant it all, every word." Look at one another and remember this moment in time. Before this moment you have been many things to one another- acquaintance, friend, companion, lover, and even teacher, for you have learned much from one another in these last few years. Now you shall say a few words that take you across a threshold of life, and things will never quite be the same between you. For after these vows, you shall say to the world, this is my husband, this is my wife.
@ktdrame
August 28th, 2009 · 11:27 PM · #
Here is a poem I intend to use at our upcoming wedding:
A Marriage by Michael Blumenthal (for Margie Smigel and Jon Dopkeen)
You are holding up a ceiling
with both arms. It is very heavy,
but you must hold it up, or else
it will fall down on you. Your arms
are tired, terribly tired,
and, as the day goes on, it feels
as if either your arms or the ceiling
will soon collapse.
But then,
unexpectedly,
something wonderful happens:
Someone,
a man or a woman,
walks into the room
and holds their arms up
to the ceiling beside you.
So you finally get
to take down your arms.
You feel the relief of respite,
the blood flowing back
to your fingers and arms.
And when your partner’s arms tire,
you hold up your own
to relieve him again.
And it can go one like this
for many years
without the house failing.
CFry
September 1st, 2009 · 7:34 PM · #
oh my god. I HAVE to use that!! there are so many things in there that exactly relate to my relationship…. like it was written for me! lol…. okay I am a nerd but THANK SO MUCH!!!!!!
Suzanne
September 8th, 2009 · 6:21 PM · #
That is wonderful!!!!!!!!!!
Janet
September 13th, 2009 · 3:39 AM · #
I'm lovin the idea of someone doing a reading with Dr. Seuss. I just wish I knew people who would do it. lol
Sharde
September 18th, 2009 · 1:15 AM · #
this is -perfect-!
Elissa
September 19th, 2009 · 7:06 AM · #
Such wonderful readings! You have awesomely creative readers! Trust I'll be poring over these for inspiration!!
Liz
September 21st, 2009 · 3:45 AM · #
A Serenity Quote, Where the sidewalk ends and a request for Harry Potter. Now I am home. Thank you all so much for the lovely ideas, and congrats to all the new offbeat brides out there!
eve
September 23rd, 2009 · 4:19 AM · #
Jeffrey mcdaniel never fails to be simultaneously witty & tremendously talented…this is a poem he wrote for some friends upon their engagement, beautiful stuff:
The Archipelago of Kisses
We live in a modern society. Husbands and wives don't
grow on trees, like in the old days. So where
does one find love? When you're sixteen it's easy,
like being unleashed with a credit card
in a department store of kisses. There's the first kiss.
The sloppy kiss. The peck.
The sympathy kiss. The backseat smooch. The we
shouldn't be doing this kiss. The but your lips
taste so good kiss. The bury me in an avalanche of tingles kiss.
The I wish you'd quit smoking kiss.
The I accept your apology, but you make me really mad
sometimes kiss. The I know
your tongue like the back of my hand kiss. As you get
older, kisses become scarce. You'll be driving
home and see a damaged kiss on the side of the road,
with its purple thumb out. If you
were younger, you'd pull over, slide open the mouth's
red door just to see how it fits. Oh where
does one find love? If you rub two glances, you get a smile.
Rub two smiles, you get a warm feeling.
Rub two warm feelings and presto-you have a kiss.
Now what? Don't invite the kiss over
and answer the door in your underwear. It'll get suspicious
and stare at your toes. Don't water the kiss with whiskey.
It'll turn bright pink and explode into a thousand luscious splinters,
but in the morning it'll be ashamed and sneak out of
your body without saying good-bye,
and you'll remember that kiss forever by all the little cuts it left
on the inside of your mouth. You must
nurture the kiss. Turn out the lights. Notice how it
illuminates the room. Hold it to your chest
and wonder if the sand inside hourglasses comes from a
special beach. Place it on the tongue's pillow,
then look up the first recorded kiss in an encyclopedia: beneath
a Babylonian olive tree in 1200 B.C.
But one kiss levitates above all the others. The
intersection of function and desire. The I do kiss.
The I'll love you through a brick wall kiss.
Even when I'm dead, I'll swim through the Earth,
like a mermaid of the soil, just to be next to your bones.
Mary Ann
October 20th, 2009 · 11:13 PM · #
Here's a great one:
Facets of Marriage by Derek Rumpf
Marriage is like a diamond, many facets both dark and light
One thing to balance another, as the day does for the night.
The union of a couple is indeed a wonderful thing,
Yet remember the sweet and salt, whatever life may bring.
The perfume of the rose, brings to you an olfactory treat,
But the dishes left undone, can they not smell just as sweet?
The letter left handwritten, such nostalgia and romance,
The text message comes through, “Can you pick up milk by chance?”
Shouting love over the rooftops, for all the world to hear,
The seat was left straight up, “Who used it last my dear?”
The flower petals on the floor, set a scene with romantic air,
But forget them not those socks and pants strewn about with equal flair.
A gourmet meal before you, what a scrumptious, wondrous feast,
Yet mac and cheese with hotdogs, this still feeds a hungry beast.
One time spending money, on a wonderful, fanciful thing,
Another time scraping by, to escape the mortgage sting.
At home and trading stories of the goings-on of the day,
It’s time to do some house chores, “Must we get to that today?”
There you stand fit-as-a-fiddle, my what a handsome pair,
Now stand you soft-in-the-middle, breathless at the stair.
Vacationing in a far off place, with palm trees all around,
Working hard for most of the year, with no time to be found.
Yes, the union of a couple, is indeed a wonderful thing,
Yet remember the sweet and salt, whatever life may bring.
Whether perfect or disorderly, fair skies or fowl, harsh weather,
It’s all part of the program, you just have to do it together.
Cori Jessy
October 31st, 2009 · 6:42 PM · #
Oh my goodness, YES the Avett Brothers. The things they write are amazing.
quince23
November 6th, 2009 · 5:43 PM · #
My favorite is this, as it speaks to the work involved in a marriage:
Scaffolding
Seamus Heaney
Masons, when they start upon a building,
Are careful to test out the scaffolding;
Make sure that planks won’t slip at busy points,
Secure all ladders, tighten bolted joints.
And yet all this comes down when the job’s done
Showing off walls of sure and solid stone.
So if, my dear, there sometimes seem to be
Old bridges breaking between you and me
Never fear. We may let the scaffolds fall
Confident that we have built our wall.