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Religious Selection
Hindu Marriage Poem 
You have become mine forever
Yes, we have become partners.
I have become yours.
Hereafter, I cannot live without you.
Do not live without me.
Let us share the joys.
We are word and meaning, unite.
You are thought and I am sound.
May the nights be honey-sweet for us
May the mornings be honey-sweet for us.
May the plants be honey-sweet for us.
May the earth be honey-sweet for us.
Love is a Mighty Power From The Imitation of Christ
Thomas A Kempis
(1379 – 1471)
Love is a mighty power, a great and complete good.
Love alone lightens every burden, and makes rough places smooth.
It bears every hardship as though it were nothing,
And renders all bitterness sweet and acceptable.
Nothing is sweeter than love,
Nothing stronger,
Nothing higher,
Nothing wider,
Nothing more pleasant,
Nothing fuller or better in heaven or earth; for love is born of God.
Love flies, runs and leaps for joy.
It is free and unrestrained.
Love knows no limits, but ardently transcends all bounds.
Love feels no burden, takes no account of toil,
Attempts things beyond its strength.
Love sees nothing as impossible,
For it feels able to achieve all things.
It is strange and effective, while those who lack love faint and fail.
Love is not fickle and sentimental, nor is it intent on vanities.
Like a living flame and a burning torch, it surges upward and surely surmounts every obstacle.
On Love – Kahlil Gibran From The Prophet
Love has no other desire but to fulfill itself.
But if you love and must needs have desires, let these be your desires:
To melt and be like a running brook that sings its melody to the night.
To know the pain of too much tenderness.
To be wounded by your own understanding of love,
And to bleed willingly and joyfully.
To wake at dawn with a winged heart and give thanks for another day of loving;
To rest at the noon hour and meditate love´s ecstasy;
To return home at eventide with gratitude;
And then to sleep with a prayer for the beloved in your heart and a song of praise on your lips.
Traditional Selection
Jane Eyre - Charlotte Bronte
I have for the first time found what I can truly love – I have found you.
You are my sympathy – my better self – my good angel
I am bound to you with a strong attachment.
I think you good, gifted, lovely:
a fervent, a solemn passion is conceived in my heart;
it leans to you, draws you to my center and spring of life,
wraps my existence about you
and, kindling in pure, powerful flame, fuses you and me in one.
Sonnet from the Portuguese XLIII – Elizabeth Barrett Browning
(1806 – 1861)
How do I love thee? Let me count the ways.
I love thee to the depth and breadth and height
My soul can reach, when feeling out of sight
For the ends of Being and ideal Grace.
I love thee to the level of everyday´s
Most quiet need, by sun and candlelight.
I love thee freely, as men strive for Right;
I love thee purely, as they turn from Praise.
I love thee with the passion put to use
In my old grief´s, and with my childhood´s faith.
I love thee with a love I seemed to lose
With my lost saints, – I love thee with the breath,
Smiles, tears, of all my life! – and, if God choose,
I shall but love thee better after death.
The Bargain – Sir Philip Sidney
(1554 – 1586)
My true love hath my heart, and I have his,
By just exchange one for another given;
I hold his dear, and mine he cannot miss;
There never was a better bargain driven:
My true love hath my heart, and I have his.
My heart in me keeps him and me in one;
My heart in him his thoughts and senses guides;
He loves my heart, for once it was his own;
I cherish his because in me it bides;
My true love hath my heart, and I have his.
The Newly Wedded – Winthrop Mackworth Praed
(1802 – 1839)
Now the rite is duly done,
Now the word is spoken,
And the spell has made us one
Which may ne´er be broken:
Rest we, dearest, in our home,
Roam we o´er the heather,
We shall rest, and we shall roam,
Shall we not? together.
From this hour the summer rose
Sweeter breathes to charm us;
From this hour the winter snows
Lighter fall to harm us:
Fair or foul – on land or sea –
Come the wind or weather,
Best or worst, what´er they be,
We shall share together.
To my dear loving husband – Anne Bradstreet (1612 – 1672)
If ever two were one, then surely we.
If ever man were loved by wife, then thee;
If ever wife was happy in a man,
Compare with me, ye woman, if you can.
I prize thy love more than whole mines of gold
Or all the riches that the East doth hold.
My love is such that rivers cannot quench,
Nor ought but love from thee, give recompense.
Thy love is such I can no way repay,
The heavens reward thee manifold, I pray.
The while we live, in love let´s so persevere,
That when we live no more, we may live ever.
Romantic Selection
A White Rose John Boyle O´Reilly (1844 1890)
The red rose whispers of passion,
And the white rose breathes of love;
O the red rose is a falcon,
And the white rose is a dove.
But I send you a cream-white rosebud
With a flush on its petal tips;
For the love that is purest and sweetest
Has a kiss of desire on the lips.
Give Me your Heart – Anon
Give me your heart, beloved. Give me your hand, my true friend With each passing day I grow more fond; With each passing day, our small portion of love takes its place in the truth of time. With the years that we have been given, Let us grow deeply into life so that we may love all the more.
My Love Is Like A Red Rose (Adapted from Robert Burns)
O my love is like a red, red rose
That’s newly sprung in June;
O my love is like the melody
That’s sweetly played in tune.
As fair art thou, my bonnie lass,
So deep in love, am I;
And I will love thee still, my dear,
Till all the seas go dry.
True Love – Anon
True love is a sacred flame that burns eternally
And none can dim its special glow or change its destiny
True love speaks in tender tones and hears with gentle ear
True love gives with open heart and true love conquers fear
True love makes no harsh demands it neither rules nor binds
And true love holds with gentle hands the hearts that it entwines
Voltaire
Sensual pleasure passes and vanishes in the twinkling of an eye,
but the friendship between us, the mutual confidence, the delights of the heart,
the enchantment of the soul, these things do not perish
and can never be destroyed. I shall love you until I die.
Contemporary Selection
A Good Wedding Cake – Author Unknown
4 lb of love
½ lb of good looks
1 lb of sweet temper
1 lb of butter of youth
1 lb of blindness of faults
1 lb of pounded wit
1 lb of good humour
2 tablespoons of sweet argument
1 pint of rippling laughter
1 wine glass of common sense
A dash of modesty
Put the love, good looks and sweet temper into a well-furnished house.
Beat the butter of youth to a cream, and mix well together with the blindness of faults.
Stir the pounded wit and good humour into the sweet argument,
then add the rippling laughter and common sense.
Add a dash of modesty
and work the whole together until everything is well mixed.
Bake gently for ever
A Word to Husbands Ogden Nash (1902–7I)
To keep your marriage brimming,
With love in the loving cup,
Whenever you're wrong, admit it;
Whenever you're right, shut up.
Love is Giving – Anon
Love is giving, not taking, mending, not breaking, trusting, believing,
never deceiving, patiently bearing and faithfully sharing each joy, every sorrow, today and tomorrow.
Love is kind, understanding, but never demanding.
Love is constant, prevailing, its strength never failing.
A promise once spoken for all time unbroken,
Love's time is forever.
Marriage is. . . – Anon
Marriage is a dynamic process of discovery.
Marriage is a journey, not an arrival.
In marriage, being the right person is as important as finding the right person.
Marriage is starting to love, over and over again.
Marriage is a life's work.
Marriage is an art...
and like any creative process,
it requires active thought and effort.
We have to learn how to share on many different levels.
We need to practice talking from the heart,
and understanding attitudes as well as words.
Giving generously and receiving graciously
are talents that are available to anyone.
But all these skills need to be developed,
if the marriage picture that we paint
is to be anything approaching the masterpiece intended. .
On your wedding day – Author Unknown
Today is a day you will always remember
The greatest in anyone’s life
You’ll start off the day just two people in love
And end it as Husband and Wife
It’s a brand new beginning, the start of a journey
With moments to cherish and treasure
And although there’ll be times when you both disagree
These will surely be outweighed by pleasure
You’ll have heard many words of advice in the past
When the secrets of marriage were spoken
But you know that the answers lie hidden inside
Where the bond of true love lies unbroken
So live happy forever as lovers and friends
It’s the dawn of a new life for you
As you stand there together with love in your eyes
From the moment you whisper ‘I do’
And with luck all your hopes and your dreams can be real
May success find its way to your hearts
Tomorrow can bring you the greatest of joys
But today is the day it all starts
Readings Spoken One to Another
Eskimo Love Song – Traditional Eskimo
You are my husband/wife
My feel shall run because of you
My feet dance because of you
My heart shall beat because of you
My eyes see because of you
My mind thinks because of you
And I shall love because of you
These I can Promise – Anon
I cannot promise you a life of sunshine;
I cannot promise riches, wealth, or gold;
I cannot promise you an easy pathway
That leads away from change or growing old.
But I can promise all my heart’s devotion;
A smile to chase away your tears of sorrow;
A hand to hold in yours through each tomorrow.
This day I married my Best Friend – Anon
This day I married my best friend
.. the one I laugh with as we share life’s wondrous zest,
as we find new enjoyments and experience all that’s best.
.. the one I live for because the world seems brighter
as our happy times are better and our burdens feel much lighter.
.. the one I love with every fibre of my soul.
We used to feel vaguely incomplete, now together we are whole.
Blessings and Sayings
Apache Blessing – Anon
Now you will feel no rain, for each of you will be the shelter for each other.
Now you will feel no cold, for each of you will be the warmth for the other.
Now you will feel no loneliness, for each of you will be companionship to the other
Now you are two persons, but there are three lives before you; his life, her life and your life together
Go now to your dwelling place to enter into the days of your life together.
May beauty surround you both in the journey ahead and through all the years may happiness be your companion to the place where the river meets the sun,
And may your days be good and long upon the earth.
Treat yourselves and each other with respect, and remind yourselves often of what brought you together. Give the highest priority to the tenderness, gentleness and kindness that your connection deserves. When frustration, difficulty and fear assail your relationship — as they threaten all relationships at one time or another — remember to focus on what is right between you, not only the part which seems wrong. In this way, you can ride out the storms when clouds hide the face of the sun in your lives — remembering that even if you lose sight of it for a moment, the sun is still there. And if each of you takes responsibility for the quality of your life together, it will be marked by abundance and delight.
Tasso (1544)
Any time that is not spent on love is wasted.
Lord Tennyson (1809)
Brief is life but long is love.
Shakespeare (1564)
If music be the food of love, play on.
Irish Toast
May you have warm words on a cold evening, a full moon on a dark night, and the road downhill all the way to your door.
Anon
May your hands be forever clasped in friendship, and your hearts joined forever in love.
Mark Twain (1835)
To get the full value of joy you must have someone to divide it with.
Just for Kids
Wedding poem for 2
Mummy may I read to you,
a little poem made for two
It's your wedding day today,
and I wanted just to say
A prince has fallen in love with you.
Making all your dreams come true
I hope you'll both be happy and glad,
and thank you for being my mum and dad.
Happy Wedding Day
Happy wedding day to you.
May your dreams today come true
We've all seen how happy you are
May your love last ever more.
Son's Wedding Wishes
Now its wedding day for mum,
here's a small word from your son
Always smile when times are tough,
afterwards share lots of love
Listen always to each other,
laugh and sing with one another
You two both belong together,
may your love live on forever
Daughter's Wedding Wishes
Just a word to Dad/Mum from daughter,
marrying today you really oughta
Seeing how you fit together,
clearly are a match forever
May your love grow more each day,
and that is all I need to say
The Family's Complete
It's a special day for us; time to make a lot of fuss
Time to yell and time to say - waited ages for this day!
Now the time has finally come, when we can stand beside our Mum
Watch her make her special vow to someone who she says is Wow!
He makes her laugh and sometimes sing, his love for her is everything
Seeing Mum happy is such a treat, now our family is complete.
Football Wedding Match
It's a special day for us all;
we've been waiting til now
to run with the ball
Stood in the sidelines,
cheering them on,
wondering when the game would be won
Now that it's here we can hardly wait,
crowds are here for this special date
We've come to see the match of the year;
some of us may just shed a tear
The vows will be spoken the promises made,
the knot will be tied and the rings exchanged
When it is finished the ref will declare,
my Mum and my Dad are truly a pair.
Brother's Wedding Ditty
Hello . (groom's name) and hello Mum,
here's a word from your older/younger son
I just wanted to say on this special day
I'm so glad you found each other,
lots of love from me and brother
Wise Son's Wedding Blessing
Here's a word of wisdom true, spoken secretly to you
As your son I know how much, it means to be in love and such
So be happy, be yourself, love is more than the greatest of wealth
Listen, laugh, dance and sing, share your hearts and everything
Have a ball and rarely fight, keep your friendship true and tight
Wishing you a married life, full of sunshine, little strife
And when you think back to this day, smile and remember what I say
How Your Children See Your Day - Sandra Cook 2011
Today you're getting married; some say you're getting wed
There's crowds of people in our house, and strangers in my bed!
We had to get up early, take breakfast all together
Allowed to have the TV on to listen to the weather
Shower time was hectic, should have seen the queue
Girls were taking twice as long and air was turning blue
Hair was being straightened, perfume being sprayed
Nails were being painted, the boys of course delayed
Lots of make-up lots of shoes, sparkles in the hair
Pretty cards and parcels, flowers everywhere
Everyone had new clothes, Dad even wore a suit
Mum is looking stunning, and I look kinda cute
Posh car turned up at the door, took my Mum away
Left me with the other kids but told I couldn't play
Lots of photos lots of fuss, whats it all about?
Parties are for having fun, there's no need to shout!
Mummy looks real pretty, Daddy's not too bad
Someone here is crying but doesn't look real sad
Lots of people laughing, sometimes very loud
Then it goes all quiet, lady talking to the crowd
Daddy holds Mum closely, putting on a ring
Says some words and makes a speech and makes them cry again
Mummy takes another ring and puts it on his finger
Says some words and makes a speech and then we hear a singer
Someone says a poem, lots of people clap
Waking up the funny man who's taking a quick nap
Now we are all standing, watching
them both kiss
They look so very happy, think they call it bliss!
Time to do some writing in a great big book
And with all those cameras, which way shall we look?
Is it nearly over, can I go and play?
Lets come back tomorrow, we can do it all again