As for that pair in the pea pod—

I heard, years ago, about a wedding where the meditation consisted of a relative getting up and reciting a poem of her choice—Edward Lear’s, featuring our very owl and cat and a piggy-wig with a ring at the end of his nose. Bizarre, I thought. Usually, at weddings, the lordly preacher read 1 Corinthians 13. But now I can see some meaning. Honey and money. Mince and quince and a runcible spoon. True, love always protects, always trusts, always hopes, always perseveres, never fails. Only, that’s love with a capital L, the ideal. The imperfect kind is all I know.

Bong-Tree land vs. Love land where patience, kindness, trust, and smashed egos rule? Which sounds more like a fairy tale?

Someone here might be an owl, forever peering through the tube of his microscope at chlorophyll cells or some still-wriggling creek sample, or gawking at me down the ramp of his nose, askance, like I’m doing something wrong, but I’m no pussycat.

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