The Times

Dr. Miles Myers
author, scholar, educator

Reading the newspapers
that’s where I first saw it.

Struck me as peculiar
I had this idea
in daily life,
that we’d gone past this.

Gay couples had gotten married
we’ve been to these services
I never thought much about it
until this proposition.

Well, as I said,
I thought it was part
of the woodwork
but it surfaced,
visible,
Bang!

At first it seemed odd,
then we got angry.

There were practical matters.
Marriage
as a civil action
has enormous impact
on people
and children.

Knowing gay parents
with children,
how great they were,
challenging their civil access
to parenting?
Outrageous!

There’s property.
What happens
if one of them dies
or something?
Accidents happen.
It’s a serious business.

A partner helping
someone sick,
the choices people make
sometimes they reach a point
they can’t make them,
and they need this partner
to make them.

And that’s big.
That’s a big issue.

Issues of property
can be solved in other ways:
contracts,
trusts.

But that business of relationships?
                          --Maggie Front