you were wild and free and haughty with your hair long and loose
and your torn dress. your muddy boots, your bruised kneecaps.
you were young and bold and your smile was a wicked crooked thing
and your teeth were sharp and savage behind your wind-bitten, storm-kissed lips, 

you did not care for love apart from the way your heart leapt like the spring lambs on the moors and you were beautiful
we raced through the heather and bridged the streams that rise up from the rocks like a spilled secret
and built fires high on the hills, making magic and mischief like the pagans of old and you shone as bright as the beacon

then you fell, with your serpent in the garden teaching you how to play the pianoforte perfectly
and that you should not play with boys with rough hands and rougher language and bruises shadowing their brow
and that to be wild and free is to be wrong and foolish and distasteful - said with a wince and a knowing sneaking smile

but I know how your heart works. I know how your every heartbeat feels when you’re rain-soaked and laughing and late for dinner
and you cannot be tethered. you will not let him make you into a model of well-bred beauty; your soul is far too much like mine.
love is obsession is jealousy is passion burning through my bones.

this, then, is my message, written on fine London-bought cream paper:
you always were too wild to be wedded.
and oh, what a wedding gift I have for you.