After the Wedding
everywhere was Sunday-silent by the river in the early morning
as they slid towards me – twenty seven swans describing a heart,
each following the folded cup of the wings of the swan in front,
making a shape that’s round, like valleys and hills, breasts and roses,
smiles and eyes, then coming to an apex, like prayer and churches,
like an act of love, spears of irises bright and sharp in the water,
each yellow beak leading, each long neck forward and yearning,
each pair of paddling feet, blessing the river, coming together
like a congregation witnessing love, honouring a rose-crowned bride,
a groom, sheltering as an oak, complete and endless as a pair of gold rings.
Previously pubished in Quadrant (Australia), January-February 2012
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Victoria Field is a writer and poetry therapist now living in Canterbury. She has published two collections of poetry, the second, Many Waters, is based on a year long writing residency at Truro Cathedral. She has also co-authored a pamphlet, October Guests, with Caroline Carver and Penelope Shuttle. Hall for Cornwall has produced two of her plays and she is writing a third play, Benson due to be first performed in November 2012. Her poetry, short fiction, reviews and articles have appeared in many magazines and anthologies.
She has also co-edited three books on therapeutic writing – Writing Works, Prompted to Write and, most recently, Writing Routes. She qualified as a poetry therapist with the National Association for Poetry Therapy in the US and teaches both in the UK and internationally. She is a regular tutor on the Ty Newydd, Writing in Health and Social Care programme and is a Short Course Tutor at University College, Falmouth.
Abegail Morley 