Watching the bride
and her father walk
the long distance
from the house
to the benches
in the grass,
I don’t even try
to hide my tears,
fat and warm,
my whole being aware
of how big it is
to give one’s life
to another,
and with her
every step,
my own
wedding comes
closer until
it is me
in a white dress
on the arm
of my father,
my husband
the man at the end
of the aisle,
my own lips
speaking till death
do us part,
my eyes glittering,
spilling, wet—
how sweet now
when the man
on my left
offers me his tissue
and somehow
with his kindness
and a wrinkled hand,
I touch those tears
thirty years ago.