“Love’s Philosophy” by Percy Bysshe Shelley

The fountains mingle with the river

And the rivers with the ocean,

The winds of heaven mix for ever

With a sweet emotion;

Nothing in the world is single;

All things by a law divine

In one spirit meet and mingle.

Why not I with thine?—

See the mountains kiss high heaven

And the waves clasp one another;

No sister-flower would be forgiven

If it disdained its brother;

And the sunlight clasps the earth

And the moonbeams kiss the sea:

What is all this sweet work worth

If thou kiss not me?

"I Carry Your Heart With Me" by ee cummings

"i carry your heart with me (i carry it in

my heart) i am never without it (anywhere

i go you go, my dear; and whatever is done

by only me is your doing, my darling)

i fear no fate(for you are my fate, my sweet)i want

no world(for beautiful you are my world, my true)

and it’s you are whatever a moon has always meant

and whatever a sun will always sing is you

here is the deepest secret nobody knows

(here is the root of the root and the bud of the bud

and the sky of the sky of a tree called life; which grows

higher than soul can hope or mind can hide)

and this is the wonder that's keeping the stars apart"

Always Love Each Other, by Larry S. Chengges

If you can always be as close and happy as today,

Yet be secure enough to grow and change along the way.

If you keep for you alone your love as husband and wife,

Yet find the time to share your joy with others in your life.

If you can be as one and walk through marriage hand in hand,

Yet still support the goals and dreams that each of you have planned.

If you dare to always go your separate ways together,

Then all the wonder of today will stay with you forever.

How We Love, by Beth Nielsen Chapman

Life has taught me this

Every day is new

And if anything is true

All that matters

When we’re through

Is how we love

Faced with what we lack

Some things fall apart

But from the ashes new dreams start

All that matters to the heart

Is how we love

How we love

From the smallest act of kindness

In a word, a smile, a touch

In spite of our mistakes

Chances come again

If we lose or if we win

All that matters in the end

Is how we love

How we love

I will not forget your kindness

When I needed it so much

Sometimes we forget

Trying to be so strong

In this world of right and wrong

All that matters when we’re gone

All that mattered all along

All we have that carries on

Is how we love

“Wild Geese” by Mary Oliver

You do not have to be good.

You do not have to walk on your knees

for a hundred miles through the desert repenting.

You only have to let the soft animal of your body

love what it loves.

Tell me about despair, yours, and I will tell you mine.

Meanwhile the world goes on.

Meanwhile the sun and the clear pebbles of the rain

are moving across the landscapes,

over the prairies and the deep trees,

the mountains and the rivers.

Meanwhile the wild geese, high in the clean blue air,

are heading home again.

Whoever you are, no matter how lonely,

the world offers itself to your imagination,

calls to you like the wild geese, harsh and exciting -

over and over announcing your place

in the family of things.

Irish Wedding Blessing

“May your mornings bring joy and your evenings bring peace.

May your troubles grow few as your blessings increase.

May the saddest day of your future

Be no worse than the happiest day of your past.

May your hands be forever clasped in friendship

And your love joined forever last.”

“The Bridge Across Forever” by Richard Bach

"A soulmate is someone who has locks that fit our keys, and keys to fit our locks.

When we feel safe enough to open the locks, our truest selves step out and we can be completely and honestly who we are;

We can be loved for who we are and not for who we're pretending to be.

Each unveils the best part of the other.

No matter what else goes wrong around us, with that one person we're safe in our own paradise.

Our soulmate is someone who shares our deepest longings, our sense of direction.

When we're two balloons, and together our direction is up, chances are we've found the right person.

Our soulmate is the one who makes life come to life."

An excerpt from “Les Misérables” by Victor Hugo

"You can give without loving,

but you can never love without giving.

The great acts of love are done by those who are habitually performing small acts of kindness.

We pardon to the extent that we love.

Love is knowing that even when you are alone,

you will never be lonely again.

And great happiness of life is the conviction that we are loved.

Loved for ourselves.

And even loved in spite of ourselves"

“The Union” by Robert Fulghum

You have known each other from the first glance of acquaintance to this point of commitment.

At some point, you decided to marry.

From that moment of “yes” to this moment of “yes,”

Indeed, you have been making promises and agreements in an informal way.

All those conversations that were held riding in a car

or over a meal or during long walks

—all those sentences that began with “When we’re married”

and continued with “I will and you will and we will”

—those late-night talks that included “someday” and “somehow” and “maybe”

—and all those promises that are unspoken matters of the heart.

All these common things, and more, are the real process of a wedding.

The symbolic vows that you are about to make are a way of saying to one another,

“You know all those things we’ve promised and hoped and dreamed

—well, I meant it all, every word.”

Look at one another and remember this moment in time.

Before this moment, you have been many things to one another:

acquaintance, friend, companion, lover, dancing partner, and even teacher,

for you have learned much from one another in these last few years.

Now you shall say a few words that take you across a threshold of life,

and things will never quite be the same between you.

For after these vows, you shall say to the world:

This—is my husband. This—is my wife.

“Time Travellers” by Terah Cox

May you take on the world together with all your hopes and dreams,

may you be each other’s anchor in smooth or rocky seas.

May you bend to the world’s winds and brave stalls and storms,

may you find common ground in all its changing forms.

May you cross stubborn boundaries and turn many a stone,

may you find haven for your souls, may you have heart and home.

And if some days are grey and some nights are long and cold,

may you be each other’s sun and moon as your destinies unfold.

And should you lose sight of each other and start to drift apart,

may you circle back by following the compass of your hearts.

“Maybe” by Anonymous

Maybe we are supposed to meet the wrong people before we meet the right

one—so when they finally arrive we are truly grateful for the gift we have been given.

Maybe it’s true that we don’t know what we have lost until we lose it—but it is also true that we don’t know what we’re missing until it arrives.

Maybe the happiest of people don’t have the best of everything—but make the best of everything that comes their way.

Maybe the best kind of love is the kind where you sit on the sofa together—not saying a word, and walk away feeling like it was the best conversation you ever had.

Maybe once in a lifetime you find someone who not only touches your heart—but also your soul—someone who loves you for who you are and not what you could be.

Maybe the art of true love is not about finding the perfect person—but about seeing an imperfect person perfectly.

Apache Wedding Prayer

Now you will feel no rain,

for each of you will be shelter for the other.

Now you will feel no cold,

for each of you will be warmth to the other.

Now there will be no loneliness,

for each of you will be companion to the other.

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.

A Combination of Love Psalms

I have loved you with an everlasting love. I have called you and you are Mine.

The mountains may depart, the hills may be shaken, but my

love for you will never leave you and my covenant of peace with you will never be destroyed.

I know the plans I have in mind for you, plans for peace, not disaster, reserving a

future full of hope for you.

“To Love Is Not To Possess” by James Kavanaugh

To love is not to possess,

To own or imprison,

Nor to lose one’s self in another.

Love is to join and separate,

To walk alone and together,

To find a laughing freedom

That lonely isolation does not permit.

It is finally to be able

To be who we really are

No longer clinging in childish dependency.

Nor docilely living separate lives in silence,

It is to be perfectly one’s self

And perfectly joined in permanent commitment

To another—and to one’s inner self.

Love only endures when it moves like waves,

Receding and returning gently or passionately,

Or moving lovingly like the tide,

In the moon’s own predictable harmony.

Because finally, despite a child’s scars

Or an adult’s deepest wounds,

They are openly free to be

Who they really are—and always secretly were,

In the very core of their being

Where true and lasting love can alone abide.

A Short Wedding Blessing

May you each bring your best self to the other.

May you each bring commitment as well as faith to the task that is set before you.

May you maintain enduring respect and trust.

May all who follow your lives have cause often to rejoice,

not only in your happiness,

but also in your brave and generous living.

A Prayer Poem

May the road rise to meet you.

May the wind be always at your back.

May the sun shine warm upon your face,

The rain fall soft upon your fields.

May God hold you in the palm of His hand.

Old English Blessing

May your joys be as bright as the morning,

your years of happiness as numerous as the stars in the heavens,

and your troubles but shadows that fade in the sunlight of love.

All About Love by bell hooks

Love is a combination of care, commitment, knowledge, responsibility, respect and trust.

The moment we choose to love,

we begin to move against domination,

against oppression.

The moment we choose to love,

we begin to move towards freedom,

to act in ways that liberate ourselves and others.

That action is the testimony of love

as the practice of freedom…

When we choose to love,

we choose to move against fear,

against alienation, and separation.

The choice to love, is a choice to connect,

to find ourselves, in the other.

“We’re All A Little Weird” by Dr Seuss

We are all a little weird

and life’s a little weird,

and when we find someone whose

weirdness is compatible with

ours, we join up with them and

fall in mutual weirdness and call it love.

“A Blessing for The Journey” by Wendy Egyoku Nakao

Let us vow to bear witness to the wholeness of life,

realizing the completeness of each and every thing.

Embracing our differences,

I shall know myself as you,

and you as myself.

May we serve each other

for all our days,

here, there, and everywhere.

Let us vow to open ourselves to the abundance of life.

Freely giving and receiving, I shall care for you,

for the trees and stars,

as treasures of my very own.

May we be grateful

for all our days,

here, there, and everywhere.

Let us vow to forgive all hurt,

caused by ourselves and others,

and to never condone hurtful ways.

Being responsible for my actions,

I shall free myself and you.

Will you free me, too?

May we be kind

for all our days,

here, there, and everywhere.

Let us vow to remember that all that appears will disappear.

In the midst of uncertainty,

I shall sow love.

Here! Now! I call to you:

Let us together live

The Great Peace that we are.

May we give no fear

for all our days,

here, there, and everywhere.

“A Vow” by Wendy Cope

I cannot promise never to be angry;

I cannot promise always to be kind.

You know what you are taking on, my darling –

It’s only at the start that love is blind.

And yet I’m still the one you want to be with

And you’re the one for me – of that I’m sure.

You are my closest friend, my favourite person,

The lover and the home I’ve waited for.

I cannot promise that I will deserve you

From this day on. I hope to pass that test.

I love you and I want to make you happy.

I promise I will do my very best.

Native American Blessing

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, difficulties 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.

“The Wedding Poem” by NG

This for you, for both of you,

a small poem of happiness

filled with small glories and little triumphs

a fragile, short cheerful song

filled with hope and all sorts of futures

Because at weddings we imagine the future

Because it’s all about “what happened next?”

all the work and negotiation and building and talk

that makes even the tiniest happily ever after

something to be proud of for a wee forever

This is a small thought for both of you

like a feather or a prayer,

a wish of trust and love and hope

and fine brave hearts and true.

Like a tower, or a house made all of bones and dreams

and tomorrows and tomorrows and tomorrows

“I Love You” by Roy Croft

I love you,

Not only for what you are,

But for what I am when I am with you.

I love you,

Not only for what you have made of yourself,

But for what you are making of me.

I love you for

the part of me that you bring out;

I love you for

putting your hand into my heaped-up heart

And passing over all the foolish, weak things

that you can’t help dimly seeing there,

And for drawing out into the light

All the beautiful things

that no one else had looked

Quite far enough to find.

I love you because you have done

More than any creed

Could have done

To make me good,

And more than any fate could have done

To make me happy.

You have done it

Without a touch,

Without a word,

Without a sign.

You have done it by being yourself

Perhaps that is what

Being a friend means, after all.

Opening Wedding Ceremony Readings

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