Doug Anderson: The Charm

During the reception, while the bride and groom
were smiling till their faces ached, wishing it were over,
and the parents were alternately weeping
and jockeying for position in the hierarchy to be,
and the groom’s darkling brother had a bridesmaid
bent over a birdbath in the further reaches of the garden,
her breasts flopping out of her bright pink dress,
and the minister was saying his careful goodbyes,
the two figures on the wedding cake climbed down
the sugary rubble, the little groom gallant and brave
helping his mate rappel to the floor,
whence they wound their way through the grass
into the world of unemployed figurines,
to the bar where leaned the others, discarded
rubber ducks, the ghosts of dead chicks brought home
from the fair, the chipped and unloved Hummels,
and old voodoo poppets, sad and dead as batteries.

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Copyright 2017 Doug Anderson