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By Anna
While staying at my grandparents’ house last weekend I overheard their 6:30 a.m. conversation concerning names of grandchildren’s’ significant others.
Poppo: What’s the name of the young man downstairs?
Grandma: Alex.
P: I thought it was Joel.
G: That’s Holly’s boy.
P: I know, I thought there were two Joels. We don’t need to remember these names until we know they’re going to stick around.
G: And even then who knows how long they’ll be around.
Being just as capable of divorce as the next wedded person (though A, I’m not married and B, statistically I am not as likely to divorce because my parents are not divorced), I am still not an advocate for divorce as an option. We laugh about the guy who has had five wives (Grandpa Charles on my dad’s side) and laugh at films where divorce is a theme, but the excruciating emotional pulls divorce brings is no laughing matter.
In Hungary people joke about being good at burying the dead (because they’ve lost so many wars), well in America we can joke about being good at keeping divorce attorneys employed (because we love to divorce!)
Unsurprisingly, White Americans are more likely to be for divorce in an unhappy marriage than Black Americans. Statistically, White people have more money to afford the expense of divorce. Though when we talk about divorce in statistics race is always a factor, it is not my main focus for today.
I’m talking about marriage and divorce because I will be attending yet another wedding this weekend (though I doubt it will end in divorce). And I have at least two, if not scores more, weddings to attend next summer as I am in peak wedding stage of life (21 to about age 30).
Here’s what I know about divorce based on The Pew Research Center’s research:
- Divorce is highest among White and Black Americans.
- Divorce is highest among 50-64 year olds.
- Divorce is highest in the $30K/year income bracket.
- Divorce is highest among non-college graduates.
Since divorce rates have doubled in America since 1960, I suppose my grandparents should be a bit concerned about learning names (even if that’s a bit cold) and us young folk should not be so eager for marriage, after all one has their whole life for the opportunity.
Though divorce disheartens me and is a very real fact for Americans, it is not divorce that I want to talk about, but I want to know why Americans (and Christians) tie marriage to success. Why do most Americans who are not married want to be married? Why is there not just as much gratitude and appreciation for single people? Why are single people older than the age of 30 pitied for their singleness? It seems to me that we put too much emphasis on marriage and end up with a lot of irresponsible people playing house.
By Ashlee
I wrote this poem after falling for an engaged man (I was unaware of his relational status at the time).
“ The Awards Show”
Dark cocoa eyes shadowed by a strong brow
Perfect, smart, suited
Falling for you and finding out you are
Betrothed
Well, the award for
“The Fastest and Most Swift”
goes to you in the category of
“Stealing and then Breaking My Heart.”
Dismal gray eyes and near white hair
Rugged, soft, barefoot
Wanting you until finding out you are
Dull
Well, the award for
“Suave and Smooth on the Surface”
goes to you in the category of
“First Impressions of Future Lovers.”
Daring blue eyes dance and catch light
Rare, beautiful, natural
Loving you until I find you are
Lifeless
Well, the award for
“The Most Epic Love Story”
goes to you in the category of
“Love That Will Go Down in History as Legendary.”
Companion Poem: “The Betrothal” by Edna St. Vincent Millay
Oh, come, my lad, or go, my lad,
And love me if you like.
I shall not hear the door shut
Nor the knocker strike.
Oh, bring me gifts or beg me gifts,
And wed me if you will.
I’d make a man a good wife,
Sensible and still.
And why should I be cold, my lad,
And why should you repine,
Because I love a dark head
That never will be mine?
I might as well be easing you
As lie alone in bed
And waste the night in wanting
A cruel dark head.
You might as well be calling yours
What never will be his,
And one of us be happy.
There’s few enough as is
By Ashlee
I wrote this poem even as I knew my heart was about to be handed back to me, unloved.
“Prepare a Room”
Prepare a room
For me and you
And break my heart inside
You’ll break my heart inside
The window coverings are your pride
The walls painted with our wasted time
Prepare a room
For me and you
And break my heart inside
You’ll break my heart inside
Make the bed with the heaviest sheets
Full of our regret; blankets miles deep
Prepare a room
For me and you
And break my heart inside
You’ll break my heart inside
Lay the joyful pictures facedown
They were dusty liars anyhow
Prepare a room
For me and you
And break my heart inside
You’ll break my heart inside
The wardrobe full of promises untied
The dresser drawers have knobs of lies
Prepare a room
For me and you
And break my heart inside
You’ll break my heart inside
I’ll come and meet you there
And leave with dust-sprinkled hair
And a heart that’s bite-sized.
Companion Poem:
“The Inventory of Goodbye” by Anne Sexton
I have a pack of letters,
I have a pack of memories.
I could cut out the eyes of both.
I could wear them like a patchwork apron.
I could stick them in the washer, the drier,
and maybe some of the pain would float off like dirt?
Perhaps down the disposal I could grind up the loss.
Besides — what a bargain — no expensive phone calls.
No lengthy trips on planes in the fog.
No manicky laughter or blessing from an odd-lot priest.
That priest is probably still floating on a fog pillow.
Blessing us. Blessing us.
Am I to bless the lost you,
sitting here with my clumsy soul?
Propaganda time is over.
I sit here on the spike of truth.
No one to hate except the slim fish of memory
that slides in and out of my brain.
No one to hate except the acute feel of my nightgown
brushing my body like a light that has gone out.
It recalls the kiss we invented, tongues like poems,
meeting, returning, inviting, causing a fever of need.
Laughter, maps, cassettes, touch singing its path -
all to be broken and laid away in a tight strongbox.
The monotonous dead clog me up and there is only
black done in black that oozes from the strongbox.
I must disembowel it and then set the heart, the legs,
of two who were one upon a large woodpile
and ignite, as I was once ignited, and let it whirl
into flame, reaching the sky
making it dangerous with its red
By Ashlee
I wrote this poem after sadly being unable to recall as many good memories as I could terrible ones with a past relationship I’ve been in. I could remember quite vividly all of the terrible things that were said, all the fights, all the regrettable acts, but could barely recall the beginning of the relationship, the giddy feelings or the compliments given. It broke my heart a little.
“Bruises”
There’s something that hovers
Black and blue in my mind
The way our thoughts work
How we tend to remember the worst times
And forget the best
All the rotten fruit thrown at you
The sharpest lies
The lashing tongue that
Lacerates your soul
And the times you’ve done wrong
These things get stored away
In a part of your head
Where playbacks are most vivid
While the good times
When you feel most alive
Enveloped by friends and family
And a stranger helps you find your way
Like no map can
Being given a genuine compliment
These things slip
Ever so slowly
From our minds
They were stored in the clouds
And can’t be pulled down
Like the terrible moments
Bruises in our history
Blood clots in our minds
This fact haunts me
As I try yet again to cover up
The bad with the good
And fail.
Companion Poem:
“To Memory” by Mary Elizabeth Coleridge
Strange Power, I know not what thou art,
Murderer or mistress of my heart.
I know I’d rather meet the blow
Of my most unrelenting foe
Than live—as now I live—to be
Slain twenty times a day by thee.
Yet, when I would command thee hence,
Thou mockest at the vain pretence,
Murmuring in mine ear a song
Once loved, alas! forgotten long;
And on my brow I feel a kiss
That I would rather die than miss.
