Bethany and Dan just got married! They proclaimed their wedding vows to each other on a beautiful, sunny day, in the company of family and friends at the Branford House at Avery Point. The 19th century mansion made for a beautiful setting with it’s elegant aesthetic that reminds you of the famous homes of Newport. Throughout the day were moments of celebration, reverence, joy and laughter. During the ceremony, a poem was read aloud that had been written for them… for this wedding day… and it was good… very good. It’s as good as anything I could inject from the writings of Rumi or Hafiz. It’s a fitting prologue to the story they have begun. Congratulations Bethany and Dan. Best of luck to you both! 

Let Us Say Good 

—for Bethany and Dan 

We say it like we’ve heard it said good 

& plenty, often straight from God said good 

in the beginning the light was, spark-start 

of stars orbiting; & just to pass each other was good 

at first, a glance, word, squeezing the same 

avocados at the market to test for the good 

sort of give, was, not knowing what could surpass 

the promise of an unknown pick, we’re good 

till the right sort of soften has us doubled 

in laughter, double-dipping, in sweatpants, in good 

sweat, serving at match-point who knew love- 

-all was just the start—initial rush—a good 

plot, thick & dense & tangled keeps us going, 

even when snarled in a rolling hitch, always good 

knots, that save a skiff—it’s hard to say if a brush 

of snow will lay its quiet down for good 

& stay a day a winter a decade until we realize 

that we’ve woken into the same good 

conversation: a lifetime of saying, not-saying 

a thing & let us call the sleigh bed good, 

good Sunday walks, despite cancer’s raze, still 

we can make out the steeple’s tip a good 

head above crimson maples & when in the red 

of debt or starting the string of good- 

byes that claims our days, on this one & all 

the days that gather again & again let’s say good 

together, hand in hand that in the waving 

through this life he was good by her; she, by him 

—Cate Lycurgus 2018