Here We Come, World

In her right hand she clutches red and purple 
wildflowers, her flaxen hair tumbling 
from its bun, her slender fingers laced 
in his burly fingers, trying to knit one 
understanding between them as they run 
on a white-sand California beach 
toward the camera, toward me, who 
once taught them how metaphor can name 
and hold the world. 
                                                     Now I hold this picture 
of them leaving their wedding guests behind 
as they forge their future beyond the camera. 
Toward the sun, he in his boutonniere, 
his dress shoes, the suit he’ll wear just once.  Her 
wedding frock, demure, her waist much smaller 
than my thumb which holds their picture.

She beams shyly at her sophisticated heels 
as they churn up the gleaming beach.  How 
difficult to run through sand!  How easy 
they make it look.  In spite of all the evidence 
we’ve learned, insulting love, see how they fly 
in a solar wind of joy, the two of them: 
a new metaphor that’s been set free.