Other Writings

Hello, family, and friends and welcome to Abby and Steve's wedding. We're going to start with a love poem.

My heart opens like a flower when it's with you.
In fact, every one of my molecules shouts "Liberte!"
at the renewed presence of yours
like delirious French villagers
anointing American helmets
with roses and champagne.

How do you do that?
I mean reach right through the sulfurous flames
to encircle me with the cooling light
of your liquid blue-green peace.

Love is such a risky thing.
It's bungee-jumping into the abyss of everything
and nothing.
Better to live in a world of known corners
under a beige sky
than to face that final moment of falling away,
I think.
At least it would be safer.

And yet ... I would miss the stars glinting like ice crystals
in the vaulted Taj Mahal
of our commingled synapses,
the rustle of leaves
in the failing light,
lush, cool, generous and unfailing,
the darkness that opens
when I hear you breathing near me
every night.

Love, ah love.
It's the space between us
and the space between every atom,
it's the ending and the beginning,
the serpent of life eating its tail,
the spiral of light that leads us inward, ever inward,
to every truth.

Spirituality is about interconnectedness. This is to say that we each create our own realities, but we don't do it alone. We have help, lots and lots of help. For the past eleven years, these two people - Abby and Steve - have been doing this consciously and in their own unique Abby-and-Steve way - creating a reality together. Because spirituality is about interconnectedness, this also means that every single moment is the intersection of many different energies. This moment right here, right now -- this moment is the intersection of many different things: The love of Steve for Abby; the love of Abby for Steve; the entity that is their relationship which they've nurtured and to which they've given themselves through the last eleven years; the love and affection that we have for them; the love and affection they have for us; the reality of who they are as people and their own unique resonance and stories; the reality of who we are as people and our own unique and individual resonances and stories; the beautiful home that they've created here and filled with their dreams and with all the minutiae of living; their amazing studio which they've created and which has taken on a life of its own as a vortex of creativity; the earth and the rock beneath our feet which at this very moment is supporting and nurturing us; the air in which we're bathed which is sustaining us and to which we're contributing with every single breath; the lives of all the other creatures who live here, who run and fly and burrow here - the owls and the mice, the birds and the earthworms, the trees and the grasses; and all of their movements and needs and perspectives, their ownunique resonances and stories. This is the moment when the home that is the relationship of these two people - for who they are to each other is a home - takes on a new dimension, this is the moment when Abby and Steve expand the reality of their relationship as they become part of the structure known as marriage.

Relationships are inherently spiritual because it's through them that we allow ourselves to acknowledge the reality of our own existence: That we're not alone and separate but part of a plurality, one voice in a vast choir of connection. I think that the two of you have shown through the past many years your willingness to do what it takes to feed the fires of love - to go beyond yourselves when that's what was needed, to think about what you needed individually when that's what was needed, and to allow yourselves the pleasure of each other -- which is always needed. My wish for you is that, as you go forward from this moment on, you will be nourished and sustained by the coziness of marriage and that your relationship will be deepened by it. For that's what this wedding is: a celebration of your connection to each other and a moment when you enter into a new kind of connection to everyone else.

Each year, like each person, has its own unique energetic resonance. In the language of Chinese medicine, this year resonates with the energy of the metal element. It's kind of wonderful to me that you've chosen to get married during this particular year, this year of richness and riches, this year of diamonds and emeralds and gold, of the solidity and reliability of rock, this year of the sky and clouds and air, this year of the harvest. It's wonderful to me because your marriage seems in some way to be a harvest, to be a gathering to yourselves of all the riches of the past eleven years together, years of happiness and struggle, years of being there for each other and with each other, years of delighting in each other's dreams and supporting each other in pursuing them. And my other wish is that, at those moments in the future - because there will be those moments - when things are tough, this moment in time, this beautiful wedding with all of us in attendance -- animal, vegetable, mineral and wave-form -- this event through which you celebrate a devotion to each other that you've reaffirmed every day for more than a decade, this act through which you plug into the matrix of humanity and society in a new and different way --- my wish is that, at those times of struggle, this moment and this day that's full to bursting with so much joy and life and good wishes will act as a happy, lightfilled message to your future selves.

One of the supreme expressions of the metal element is the diamond, the diamond whose brilliance comes from the way the light that enters it bounces off the walls of its tiny angled rooms. I think of this day as that diamond and all the love that is here today as the light which makes this gemstone so precious to us. This day is a precious day. Your relationship is a precious one. The music we're all making here right now - and all the fun we're going to have together very very soon - is precious.

Death walked into the house tonight, hitched up his trousers and sat down.
Everything was quiet for a time as we watched him
and he watched us.

He wore a top-hat, a gray one, and his morning-coat was gray, too.
I thought I saw a little bird on his shoulder. But then I wasn't sure.

Death yawned and leaned back in his chair; the minutes ticked by
as we waited politely for him to leave.
"I'm not going anywhere, you know,"
he said, reading our minds.
He crossed his gray-trousered legs and rubbed his tired face.

In the morning, we passed him on the way to the kitchen,
snoring lightly in his chair at the foot of the stairs.
It felt odd to have a guest in the house and we tiptoed by, trying not to wake him,
but he followed us into the kitchen anyway.
"I'm not leaving," he told us as we buttered the toast.

Death took something out of his pocket: cards with bright figures and symbols.
He turned one over and looked at us.
"It will be all right, you know," he said.

When the toast was done, we walked outside.
The light was starting to expand the sky.
We held hands on the dew-dampened grass
as Death stood behind us
and we all watched the sun come up over the trees.