{"id":4948,"date":"2017-02-08T16:08:57","date_gmt":"2017-02-08T20:08:57","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/rayvanneste.com\/?p=4948"},"modified":"2017-02-08T16:08:57","modified_gmt":"2017-02-08T20:08:57","slug":"a-marriage-poem-by-edgar-guest","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"http:\/\/rayvanneste.com\/?p=4948","title":{"rendered":"A Marriage Poem by Edgar Guest"},"content":{"rendered":"

\"ImageI\u2019ve drawn my poem of the week this week from Edgar Guest, one of my favorite poets. Since this week marks my 25th<\/sup> wedding anniversary, I have chosen Guest\u2019s marriage poem, \u201cChums.\u201d Although I would not suggest changing the language of the \u201cmarriage rite\u201d as he alludes, his sentiment is exactly right. (And, Guest says \u201cfourteen years,\u201d which I have changed for my purposes to \u201ctwenty-five years.\u201d)<\/p>\n

Chums<\/strong><\/p>\n

HUSBAND and wife for twenty-five years!
\nAnd just like children now,
\nAs fond of one another as
\nThe day they took their vow.
\nWhere he goes she goes, hand in hand,
\nAnd thus their record sums,
\nThrough all those years of joy and strife
\nThey really have been chums.<\/p>\n

Husband and wife. No, more than that,
\nFor husbands oft are known,
\nIn search of pleasure now and then,
\nTo journey off alone;
\nAnd wives have clubs and other things
\nThat interest them more
\nThan business plans their husbands make,
\nWhen honeymooning’s o’er.<\/p>\n

Not so with them \u2014 through weal or woe,
\nThrough sunshine and through rain,
\nTogether they have journeyed on;
\nShe cheered when all seemed vain.
\nHis greatest joys have always been
\nThe ones that she could share,
\nWe knew that when we saw the one,
\nThe other must be there.<\/p>\n

If I could change the marriage rite
\nThat binds a pair for life,
\n‘T would be to drop that stilted phrase,
\n‘You ‘re husband, now, and wife.’
\nFor just one little word, I think,
\nThe knot far more becomes;
\nI ‘d like to hear the parson say:
\n‘Beloved, now you ‘re chums.’<\/p>\n

– Edgar Guest<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

I\u2019ve drawn my poem of the week this week from Edgar Guest, one of my favorite poets. Since this week marks my 25th wedding anniversary, I have chosen Guest\u2019s marriage poem, \u201cChums.\u201d Although I would not suggest changing the language of the \u201cmarriage rite\u201d as he alludes, his sentiment is exactly right. (And, Guest says …<\/p>\n

Continue reading ‘A Marriage Poem by Edgar Guest’ »<\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_links_to":"","_links_to_target":""},"categories":[1],"tags":[83,261],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"http:\/\/rayvanneste.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/4948"}],"collection":[{"href":"http:\/\/rayvanneste.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"http:\/\/rayvanneste.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/rayvanneste.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/rayvanneste.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=4948"}],"version-history":[{"count":2,"href":"http:\/\/rayvanneste.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/4948\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":4950,"href":"http:\/\/rayvanneste.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/4948\/revisions\/4950"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"http:\/\/rayvanneste.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=4948"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/rayvanneste.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=4948"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/rayvanneste.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=4948"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}