Wedding Night

I remember my fiancé digging tweezers
out of my make-up bag,
telling me I needed to pluck the grey hairs out of his beard
the night before the wedding. I tell him
to shave the whole thing off.
That there are too many wizened hairs to pluck.
That his cheeks and chin and upper lip
would be patchy bald
if I yanked out all the gray hairs.

I don’t remember if my mother wove the daisies through my updoo.
Nor do I remember walking down the aisle with my father.
There were Renaissance crum horns instead of the Celtic dance.
A cassette tape malfunction. And I don’t remember promising anything.
Just his lips moving. Soundless. A broken front tooth.
I smelled like a meadow of daisies.
I wore ballet slippers to hide my height.
As a girl, my mother kept reminding me not to slouch.
Stand up straight, she would say, as she pulled my shoulders backward.

I don’t remember dancing to the Chicken Dance.
But there was a polka
and I danced it with my Ukrainian girlfriend.
She smelled of halushki and pierogi.
I don’t remember the call for last round.
But my mother tied an embroidered apron to her waist
and collected money for the Dollar Dance.
One dollar for swaying. Five dollars for a waltz.
Ten for the jitterbug. Twenty for the fox trot.

The wedding party went to a dive bar after the reception.
There was the smell of bourbon
and a stranger’s breathing on my neck.
He put both hands on my wedding dress bustle.
Told me I was a pretty little filly.
Said he was dang jealous of the man who got to ride me tonight.
Called his buddies over. They jerked my veil off.
My bouquet was filled with wrinkled and sweaty dollar bills.
My dress smelled like unfiltered Camels.

​

I don’t remember closing down the bar.
There were three men surrounding the car in the parking lot.
One was vomiting onto the windshield.
Another was zipping up his fly.

​

Another was tying a string of Budweiser cans to the bumper.
They sang “Going to the Chapel”
as they slung their arms around each other’s shoulders. Swaying.
The night vapors smelled like bourbon.
They told me they didn’t want the party to end.