Marriage

We gathered around a beautiful woman last night,

chatted and munched,

toasted and gifted,

and shared wise words for a lasting love.

 Lovely and gracious and glowing and ready,

she's about to embark on this crazy thing called marriage in just mere days now;

 

she's found her man and loves him well.

They've seen much already and face the future hand in hand. 

I've written about this before here,
but
seven years down, working on eight in, 

and with many heroic women I know trail-blazing more years than combined I can number,

I'm realizing just how miraculous this commitment has to be to last;

It just doesn't plain make sense otherwise 

to fully embrace and deeply love,
to successfully partner-up beside

 such imperfection embodied 

for much longer than,

well,

really an hour. 

Tops.

Swept away romance?

Heart-stopping passion?

Giggles and flirting and kisses and fun?

Oh that's blissful,

but like the sand it slips away so quickly,

whether through unforeseen difficulty or life's unfair blows or simply the laborious daily grind

and 

our human hands are left turned upwards

humbled,

prayerful,

receiving the same cleansing forgiveness, 

all-encompassing grace,

that washes over

and seeps right back into

this crazy, amazing, devastating, glorious, tricky, wonderful, passionate, beautiful, rewarding

miracle

called marriage.