Driving by an Oklahoma Wedding

 We clashed through the campestral quilt of Slaughterville,
              contention heating our kernels
             as we passed a wedding
powered by Mary Laura and Merlot,
outland sunflowers 
flooding its hobnailed bones.
 
            The hand-beaded bride
wore spangled white smoke boots,
an orchid-laced chignon,
           all mint peach and demure damask,
           her trembling father
           clutching his sobriety.
 
A perpetual stampede of pansy-purple bridesmaids
            sported burlap bouquets and cocky sways,
           accompanied by a funereal procession of army buddies,
obsolete frat boys preening like fluorescent flamingoes.
 
The groom stood at studied attention, pacing his palsied poise,
             every kicking pulse of the South Canadian River
             kindling in his coal-burned wandering eye.

Author

Megan Denese Mealor has been featured in numerous journals, most recently The Furious Gazelle, Chantwood Magazine, and Rumble Fish. She has two full-length poetry collections forthcoming this year: Bipolar Lexicon (Unsolicited Press) and Blatherskite (Clare Songbirds House Publishing). Megan lives in Jacksonville, Florida with her partner, son, and two mollycoddled cats.