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                            Reader's Nook: Sample Ceremony Readings

When we meet, I'll give you with a large selection of readings and vows for possible inclusion in your ceremony.  

Meanwhile, why not relax for a moment and savor a small sampling? If you like these, you can find more at RainbowVisionCeremonies.com.

                                       It's All I Have to Bring To-day

It's all I have to bring to-day,
This, and my heart beside,
This, and my heart, and all the fields,
And all the meadows wide.
Be sure you count, should I forget,
Someone the sum could tell,
This, and my heart, and all the bees
Which in the clover dwell.
                          ~ Emily  Dickinson

                                                  On Marriage

You were born together, and together you shall be forevermore.
You shall be together when the white wings of death scatter your days.
Ay, you shall be together even in the silent memory of God.
But let there be spaces in your togetherness,
And let the winds of the heavens dance between you.

Love one another, but make not a bond of love:
Let it rather be a moving sea between the shores of your souls.
Fill each other's cup but drink not from one cup.
Give one another of your bread but eat not from the same loaf
Sing and dance together and be joyous, but let each one of you be alone,
Even as the strings of a lute are alone though they quiver with the same music.

Give your hearts, but not into each other's keeping.
For only the hand of Life can contain your hearts.
And stand together yet not too near together:
For the pillars of the temple stand apart,
And the oak tree and the cypress grow not in each other's shadow.
                                                                                      ~ Kahlil Gibran

                               A Dedication to My Wife

                          To whom I owe the leaping delight
                   That quickens my senses in our wakingtime
        And the rhythm that governs the repose of our sleepingtime,
                                 the breathing in unison.

                Of lovers whose bodies smell of each other
         Who think the same thoughts without need of speech,
       And babble the same speech without need of meaning...

                       No peevish winter wind shall chill
                        No sullen tropic sun shall wither
        The roses in the rose-garden which is ours and ours only
       
                    But this dedication is for others to read:
            These are private words addressed to you in public.
                                                                      ~ T.S. Eliot 

              Eskimo Love Song

You are my husband, you are my wife
My feet 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.

                                                      Soneto XXV  

                           Antes de amarte, amor, nada era mio:
                           vacilé por las calles y las cosas:
                           nada contaba ni tenía nombre:
                           el mundo era del aire que esperaba. 

                          Yo conocí salones cenicientos,
                          túneles habitados por la luna,
                          hangares crueles que se despedían,
                          preguntas que insistían en la arena. 

                          Todo estaba vacío, muerto y mudo,
                          caído, abandonado y decaído,
                          todo era inalienablemente ajeno, 

                          todo era de 1os otros y de nadie,
                          hasta que tu belleza y tu pobreza 
                          llenaron el otoño de regalos.                                                                       ~ Pablo Neruda


                  They say a child is born
                  a blank shape to be molded,
                  a tabula rasa to be written upon.
                  But children come
                  like a plant with a rhizome -
                  its food source,
                  the genetic coding for what flower it will become,
                  how often it will bear fruit,
                  what its artistry is;
                  all of that born into it with the seed.
                  The role of the gardener, then,
                  is simply to discern the manner of plant
                  or child trying to emerge.
                  The role of the gardener,
                  or parent then,
                  is simply to ask,
                  "How do I help it grow
                  into what it is in its roots?" 
                                              ~ Dawna Markova


                         Roberta@SteppingStoneCeremonies.com  

                                           347.276.5827