I Do!
Weddings are an opportunity for two individuals to celebrate their love for, and commitment to, each other. It is an opportunity to speak from the heart, to share fond memories and funny anecdotes, to express love and fondness, hope and possibility. Time and again I have been asked by friends and family to help them make the most of what they want to say: to write or refine a speech, to capture the couple or the Big Day in a poem.
And so, with great pleasure, I am delighted to launch I Do! Wedding Words: a new and unique venture offering poetry commissions and speech writing packages from an award-winning poet.
Poetry Commissions
Would you like a bespoke poem to celebrate your special day? Whether you would rather include it on the invitations or table settings, or read it as part of the service or speeches, there are a range of packages and options available.
A Sense
of
Occasion
Marlfield House
(6th September 2019)
They gather around us like bridesmaids and I
the mother-bride. Precious as a bouquet, they lift
you into their arms, take turns to walk you down
and up the aisle, show you the hydrangeas,
the wedding cake, yourself practising vowels
in the mirror. Slowdanced through dinner
they woo you between courses and tables
with the smiles they save for their children
all sound asleep elsewhere. When it is time
for us to leave, they return you to me, delicate
fragrant sleeping flower, curled into yourself
like a white rose, all easy breaths and unfurled folds.
The bride and groom dance on, love rising and expanding
like bread. I save a slice for later, and we slip away unseen.
Aoife Lyall, Mother, Nature (Bloodaxe Books, 2021)
Wildflowers
(for my husband, on our tenth wedding anniversary)
They grow in fits and starts – scattered from a spare box you unearthed
in the garage – out of the soil you destoned for months, and sieved
and nourished with compost and topsoil you mixed by hand. At first
we do not know if they will grow, or what is weed or flower, or when
to give them water or how they will survive. Then other things need doing
and still they burst through and bloom and still we call them wildflowers
the way we say love to mean petals, pollen, stamen, seed. You pick them
for me, for our anniversary, and your wild abandon fills the crystal vases
we were given all those years ago. Up close you marvel at the variety
of the flowers, the complexities of their form, at their ability to grow
and yet to know, to say they would not be here if not for us. I look to our
children, flowers stirring in their roots, our love in their wild hearts.
Aoife Lyall, The Day Before (Bloodaxe Books, 2024)
For a Love
that Lasts
a Lifetime
Wedding Speeches
Do you know what you would like to say but not sure how to say it? Or maybe you have a speech that just needs to be polished up and made to shine?
Whether you are bride or groom, parent or sibling, best man or maid of honour, I Do! Wedding Words is here to help.
Can I read one of your speeches online?
Every speech is written with great care, love and compassion for the reader and those with whom they choose to share it. As such, I do not share the speeches online, nor are they sent to potential clients as samples of my work.
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