The Wedding

The jagged prize that fell to him
Offered him so little that humble he
(One so backward and behindhand he frequently

Can’t see 'round his own head)
Stood there like a mound of goddamn fantastic,
Painfully attuned to the piss, Rabelaisian,

Consecrating the ceremony, only hoping
The whole fucking embarrassment of it
Would dribble away like spit

Around a newly breached tooth in a toddler’s gum;
Only hoping his monster'd be made to scrape and toe
The morning into novel convolutions, though

Only hoping; only he,
Humble he, hoping —
Hoping for only . . .

All of this
As I listen
To talk of Jane Austen.