A Long Relationship
A Long Relationship
...has many secrets to share.
"There were others,
three others to be exact.
But his wife of seventeen years
was the only woman able
to nail him down."
I raise my glass
and salute the happy couple,
but soon begin shaking my head
recalling those damned promises,
presented to me like the gospel,
for my own life and marriage.
I seize this opportunity,
presented in a familiar scene,
to reflect on my past relationships,
yet only discover exit strategies
and a much younger man
unable to surrender.
Like everything which is not
the involuntary result of fleeting emotion
but the creation of time and will,
any marriage, happy or unhappy,
is infinitely more interesting than any romance,
however passionate.
~ W. H. Auden
