Wedding Photograph

Wedding photograph
Hidden from me these 29 years
I carry it around with me
Feel somehow there is a significance
It seeks to impart
To my sore, empty heart
Wondering why it was a secret
For so long

Her face
Already so much younger than mine
Pure
Despite the hard times
She’d spent growing up in that house
And these longer years since
Did little
To change that face
Protected by angels, while kept ‘in her place’

His face – in contrast – so changed
Disillusioned by time gone by
Youth robbed
Opportunities whispering as they passed
Through startled, stretched fingers
Like the confetti
Thrown so cheerfully on that day

Jubilant
In spite of how tricky the world had made it
For both of them
Love growing bigger
As it battled against the expected
Respecting her potential
Her caged brokenness
He forgot his chance to fly
Choosing instead another nest
Choosing to try, for now, together
To prove their families wrong
Then seize life’s promises later on

How innocent, how idiotic
Believing what was promised would wait
Impatient prospects that lied to you
Said he could have his cake
That day
And save it too
Now rotten, lingering only to sting his eyes
Anew
In this photograph
Hidden from me these 29 years