Three Poems: Bethany Schultz Hurst
First miracle Blessed are the jugs of water my touch turned to wine. Blessed is my mom was there but left before I truly screwed the pooch. Blessed is my hour had not yet come. Blessed the lilies. The hydrangea. My botched maid-of-honor speech, that incomprehensible list of inside jokes. Blessed, how I kept toasting. Peonies, baby’s breath, delphinium, double-fisting, puke-and-rally, hair-of-the-dog next day. Blessed the amiable groomsman backing away from my hotel room where I was sobbing later. Blessed is I totally get it. Blessed is who signed up for this? The tulips. Daisies, asters. Blessed is I was already a disaster at the ceremony’s start, talking shit beside the videographer’s hot mic as flower petals scattered. Blessed the merciful: the rewinding, the recording over. Blessed is actually that was a different wedding, but blessed that one, too, the one with all the orchids. Blessed all the dresses I had to wear that summer: long, chiffon, and each a slightly different shade of yellow. Blessed is how I wished to be slightly different in them. More blessed, I believed, would be someone not so much.