Give a Memory That Will Last a Lifetime

Writing a wedding anniversary poem or verse will be one of the most memorable gifts that your spouse will ever receive on any anniversary! First of all they will be surprised that you even knew how to write verse and they will not be a critic, but they may tear up, so be prepared for that.

Let it Flow, Don’t Overthink Things

Writing verse is not easy if you try to over think it but is quite simple if you just write from the heart and the heart is what anniversaries are all about. Before you start writing think back over the years or year and decide what in all that time makes you want to write a poem to your spouse and concentrate on that feeling. You need to really dig into that feeling, close your eyes and let that special time flood into your mind. When you are in that special moment, start writing the verse, just write, get it all down in any form, and revise later.

When the first draft of the poem is done you can begin to revise. This is the hard part if you get over-intellectual, which is not what you want to do. You must strive not to lose the feeling as you work on your poetic form. Always keep in mind that this is a poem of love and respect and must not sound insincere, it must be from your heart.

Types of Verse

There are lots of poetic forms, free verse, rhyming, sonnets, etc. but you do not need to worry about this. The best form for your anniversary poem is the form that expresses your true feelings and does not sound stilted or sappy. The poem should sound as much like you as possible, do not try to be Browning or Shakespeare, be yourself – the loving spouse.

Finding Inspiration

It might be a good idea to sneak away to the library and read some love poems; almost all books of poems have love poems in them, read some classic and some modern poets. It is very important in your reading to find a group of poems that you can actually understand (lots of poetry is dense and vague) and study that poets style so that you get a sense of how a poem works, poems are not wordy. After you get familiar with a poetic form close the book and never go back, you now know enough to write a decent anniversary poem. You may not think you know enough but you do!

To get the right poem and the right feeling write five different versions of your poem paying strict attention to what the feeling is that you are trying to convey and not worry about form. Each of the five versions should be different in the way that you try to get the feeling right….

Overly Simple Starting Point

I love you

I love you

I love you

I do!

More Complex Example

The above form will work and is very simple, but a more complex form like this will work….

Loving you has been the best time

Now I want more time, your time

Twenty-five years have been smiles and tears

Twenty-five more will be enough time

To say I love you all the time

As you can tell these are not poems worthy of publication, but they are sincere, they are verse and they do get the point across that you love your spouse. The idea of an original anniversary verse is to create a message reflective of your feelings toward your spouse in verse or poem form.

A Little Help From My Friends

Another way to write an original anniversary poem is to find a poem and adapt it to your feelings about your spouse, the originality is in the way you make the adapted poem yours. You can always end your adapted poem with the words, “With a little help from William Shakespeare”.

Sonnet 1
Classic Poem by William Shakespeare

From fairest creatures we desire increase,
That thereby beauty’s rose might never die,
But as the riper should by time decease,
His tender heir might bear his memory:
But thou, contracted to thine own bright eyes,
Feed’st thy light’st flame with self-substantial fuel,
Making a famine where abundance lies,
Thyself thy foe, to thy sweet self too cruel.
Thou that art now the world’s fresh ornament
And only herald to the gaudy spring,
Within thine own bud buriest thy content
And, tender churl, makest waste in niggarding.

The sonnet is a classical and stilted form of poetry but it provides a good form to work with. For example you might do something like this.

You are the love of my life.

Time will never destroy this love,

Twenty-five and twenty-five more,

Will not be a memory but a life

That will not be destroyed by death.

Before eternity, I will love you

Everyday in all the ways I can.

Thanking you all the way to heaven’s gate

For this chance to love you.

The above adaptation is nothing like the Shakespearean sonnet but using a classical poem as a guide gives you a little confidence as you begin to write your poem to express your feelings for that special spouse in your own original words.

Write it On a Card

Even if you write your first draft on a computer, the poem will mean more if it is hand written.

Some anniversary cards already have a lot of text on them which could dampen your original message, but some cards come without many words on them and can be an ideal medium for carrying your message. And a card is less likely to get lost or damaged than a regular stock piece of paper. Some cards also allow you to record an audio message, allowing you to read your poem aloud.

Another simple & low-budget option is to print a piece of paper with a design on one site and write your poem on the opposite site. Tools like Canva make it easy to create custom designs. Here are a couple free templates you can use.

Left click to open an enlarged version of the picture in a new window, then in the new browser window hit Control-P to print or select print from your browser menu.

Have Fun With It

Writing original poetry or verse is not easy but it is a fun way to really get to the bottom of how you feel about someone you have spent five or twenty-five years with and I suspect that after five or twenty-five years if you are writing a poem to your spouse those twenty-five years have been good and looking to your future together is exciting. After five or twenty-five years if you are still in love and still respect your spouse there must be thousands of poetic feelings that are available for your poem.

People are afraid of poetry because of all the myths about poetry but poetry has been the language of love and respect for centuries and your use of poetry to express your feelings about your marriage in poetry shows how special you are and how special your spouse is.

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