What Marriage Is Against

is a debate worth having.
If the measure were statistics
then more marriages dissolve,
and are stalled before they begin,
than ever before,
under the yoke of consumer choice.

Being a doubter I'd have to say
that it is against reason and friendship.
I would side with those two any day,
when what used to make marriage
work was a legalistic monoculture
supported by an extended family,
who sanctioned disfavour
through shame and scape-goating.

For family leaders 'Family' was a religion
which bound the led with it's lack of choice.
Everyone had to follow The Tradition.
Whatever the label of the faith in the wider culture,
from religions of the book to all the others,
without the binding family structure it meant nothing.

My father's place of worship was the pub,
and there were many pubs in the in the town.
It was a full time job to keep them all busy.
Were he to speak on the matter
he would have said, 'No pub, no drug,
nor any brewery ever started a war,
nor were any of them ever the cause
of domestic disharmony.
The blame  for all that should be laid
at the foot of all the local church doors,
for not doing more to stop those things'.