Carry the Bow

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Carry the Bow


Against conventional wisdom the groom 

entrusted him the real thing—Eumaeus, 

a boy in a Tennessee church, 

in his pocket both the rings. 

He spent all afternoon thumbing 

the promise, that smooth curve 

final and firm as his name, 

his own name, printed in 

the program, but all the same 

he thought it would never come.  


Then suddenly it was time. 


The doors swung wide. From both sides

suitors leered, smiling sweetly 

as they willed him to trip 

and toss the band so their fingers 

could go plunging in. 

He shot straight ahead, remembered

what he’d been told. 

He couldn’t see the face but knew 

it was him, backlit gold.


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