Writing Your Own Wedding Vows

Writing your own wedding vows is a very popular wedding tradition, but some couples have a hard time finding the right words to say. To help inspire you, The Everything Wedding Vow Book has a variety of some of the greatest poems relating to love and marriage. You can use one or more of them, or as a starting point for developing your own vows. Whatever you decide to say, remember to speak from your heart.

For example, you might decide to use the first extract that appears below, from Burr's "Certainty Enough," by having each partner recite two lines in sequence, and then conclude with something like this:

Bride: John, you are my constant star, the enduring point of light in my life. I give myself to you today for as long as I shall live on this earth.

Groom: Kathy, you are the constant source of love and support I have always longed for. I give myself to you today for as long as I shall live on this earth.

Alternatively, you may decide to use a quote as a supplementary reading during your wedding ceremony.

I am not sure that Earth is round
Nor that the sky is really blue.
The tale of why the apples fall
May or may not be true.
I do not know what makes the tides
Nor what tomorrow's world may do,
But I have certainty enough,
For I am sure of you.
-Amelia Josephine Burr

Drink to me only with thine eyes,
And I will pledge with mine;
Or leave a kiss but in the cup,
And I'll not look for wine.
The thirst that from the soul doth rise
Doth ask a drink divine;
But might I of Jove's nectar sup,
I would not change for thine.
-Ben Jonson

...come the wild weather, come sleet or come snow, We will stand by each other, however it blow.
-Simon Dach

We loved with a love that was more than a love.
-Edgar Allan Poe

...Love is not love Which alters when it alteration finds, Or bends with the remover to remove: O, no! it is an ever-fixed mark, That looks on tempests and is never shaken; It is the star to every wandering bark, Whose worth's unknown, although his height be taken.
-William Shakespeare

Love's mysteries in souls do grow, But yet the body is his book.
-John Donne

Our boat to the waves go free, By the bending tide, where the curled wave breaks, Like the track of the wind on the white snowflakes; Away, away! 'Tis a path o'er the sea.
-William Ellery Channing

Thou art the star that guides me Along life's changing sea; And whate'er fate betides me, This heart still turns to thee.
-George P. Morris

Now the rite is duly done, Now the word is spoken, And the spell has made us one Which may ne'er be broken.
-Winthrop Mackworth Praed

My fellow, my companion, held most dear, My soul, my other self, my inward friend.
-Mary Sidney Herbert

Flesh of my flesh, bone of my bone, I here, though there, yet both but one.
-Anne Bradstreet

Each shining light above us Has its own peculiar grace; But every light of heaven Is in my darling's face.
-John Hay

Those worlds, for which the conqueror sighs, For me would have no charms: My only world thy gentle eyes -- My throne thy circling arms! Oh, yes, so well, so tenderly Thou'rt loved, adored by me, Whole realms of light and liberty Were worthless without thee.
-Thomas Moore

So they lovd as love in twain Had the essence but in one; Two distincts, division none...
-William Shakespeare

I think true love is never blind, But rather brings an added light, An inner vision quick to find The beauties hid from common sight. No soul can ever clearly see Another's highest, noblest part; Save through the sweet philosophy And loving wisdom of the heart.

Love is not getting, but giving; It is goodness, and honor, and peace and pure living.
-Henry Van Dyke

O, human love! thou spirit given On Earth, of all we hope in Heaven!
-Edgar Allan Poe

Love, all alike, no season knows, nor clime, Nor hours, days, months, which are the rags of time.
-John Donne

My bounty is as boundless as the sea. My love as deep; the more I give to thee, The more I have, for both are infinite.
-William Shakespeare

Were you the earth, dear Love, and I the skies, My love should shine on you like to the sun, And look upon you with ten thousand eyes Till heaven wax'd blind, and till the world were done.
-Joshua Sylvester

The violet loves a sunny bank, The cowslip loves the lea, The scarlet creeper loves the elm, But I love -- thee.
The sunshine kisses mount and vale, The stars they kiss the sea, The west winds kiss the clover bloom, But I kiss -- thee.
The oriole weds his mottled mate, The lilys bride o the bee; Heavens marriage ring is round the earth, -- Shall I wed thee?
-Bayard Taylor

I wonder, by my troth, what thou and I did till we lov'd?
-John Donne

Two human loves make one divine.
-Elizabeth Barrett Browning

Young bride -- a wreath for thee, Of sweet and gentle flowers; For wedded love was pure and free In Eden's happy bowers.
Young bride -- a song for thee, A song of joyous measure, For thy cup of hope shall be Filled with honeyed pleasure...
Young bride -- a prayer for thee, That all thy hopes possessing, Thy soul may praise her God and he May crown thee with His blessing.
-Martin Farquhar Tupper

One half of me is yours, the other half yours -- Mine own, I would say; but if mine, then yours, And so all yours!
-William Shakespeare

One heart's enough for me -- One heart to love, adore -- One heart's enough for me -- O, who could wish for more? The birds that soar above, And sing their songs on high, Ask but for one to love, And therefore should not I?
One pair of eyes to gaze, One pair of sparkling blue, In which sweet love betrays Her form of fairest hue; One pair of glowing cheeks, Fresh as the rose and fair, Whose crimson blush bespeaks The health that's native there.
One pair of hands to twine Love's flowers fair and gay, And form a wreath divine, Which never can decay; And this is all I ask, One gentle form and fair--Beneath whose smiles to bask And learn love's sweetness there.
-Auguste Mignon

How much do I love thee? Go ask the deep sea How many rare gems In its coral caves be; Or ask the broad billows, That ceaselessly roar, How many bright sands Do they kiss on the shore?
-Mary Ashley Townsend

God hath made nothing single.
-Emily Dickinson

I'll love him more, more Than eer wife loved before, Be the days dark or bright.
-Jean Ingelow

Joy, gentle friends! Joy and fresh days of love Accompany your hearts!
-William Shakespeare

The fountains mingle with the river, And the rivers with the ocean; The winds of heaven mix forever, With a sweet emotion; Nothing in the world is single; All things by a law divine In one another's being mingle; Why not I with thine?
-Percy Bysshe Shelley

Love comforteth like sunshine after rain.
-William Shakespeare

Love to faults is always blind, Always is to joy inclin'd, Lawless, wing'd, and unconfin'd, And breaks all chains from every mind.
-William Blake

...true love is a durable fire, In the mind ever burning, Never sick, never old, never dead, From itself never turning.
-Sir Walter Raleigh

Love sought is good, but given unsought is better.
-William Shakespeare

Come live with me and be my love, And we will all the pleasures prove, That hills and valleys, dales and fields, Woods or craggy mountains yield.
-Christopher Marlowe

All love is sweet, Given or returned. Common as light is love, And its familiar voice wearies not ever. They who inspire it most are fortunate, As I am now; but those who feel it most Are happier still.
-Percy Bysshe Shelley

I know not if I know what true love is, But if I know, then, if I love not him, I know there is none other I can love.
-Alfred, Lord Tennyson

That Love is all there is, Is all we know of Love...

...Life with its myriad grasp Our yearning souls shall clasp By ceaseless love and still expectant wonder; In bonds that shall endure Indissolubly sure Till God in death shall part our paths asunder.
-Arthur Penrhyn Stanley

Such is my love, to thee I so belong, That for thy right myself will bear all wrong.
-William Shakespeare

Rarely, rarely, comest thou, Spirit of Delight! I love all that thou lovest, Spirit of Delight The fresh Earth in new leaves dressed, And the starry night; Autumn evening and the morn When the golden mists are born. I love tranquil solitude, And such society as is quiet, wise and good; Between thee and me What difference? but thou dost possess The things I seek, not love them less.
-Percy Bysshe Shelley

If love were what the rose is, And I were like the leaf, Our lives would grow together In sad or singing weather, Blown fields or flowerful closes, Green pleasures or gray grief; If love were what the rose is, And I were like the leaf.
-Algernon Charles Swinburne

Love makes those young whom age doth chill, And whom he finds young, keeps young still.
-William Cartwright

Teacher, tender comrade, wife, A fellow-farer true through life.
-Robert Louis Stevenson

For thy sweet love rememberd such wealth brings, That then I scorn to change my state with kings.
-William Shakespeare

As dew beneath the wind of morning, As the sea which whirlwinds waken, As the bird's at thunder's warning, As aught mute yet deeply shaken, As one who feels an unseen spirit Is my heart when thine is near it.
-Percy Bysshe Shelley

Grow old along with me! The best is yet to be. The last of life, for which the first was made. Our times are in his hand Who saith, A whole I planned; Youth shows but half. Trust God; see all, nor be afraid!
-Robert Browning

How do I love thee? Let me count the ways. I love thee to the depth and breadth and height My soul can reach, when feeling out of sight For the ends of Being and ideal Grace. I love thee to the level of every day's Most quiet need, by sun and candlelight. I love thee freely, as men strive for Right; I love thee purely, as they turn from Praise. I love thee with the passion put to use In my old griefs, and with my childhood's faith. I love thee with a love I seemed to lose With my lost saints -- I love thee with the breath, Smiles, tears of all my life! -- and if God choose, I shall but love thee better after death.
-Elizabeth Barrett Browning

If ever two were one, then surely we.
If ever man were loved by wife, then thee.
-Anne Bradstreet

She walks in beauty, like the night
Of cloudless climes and starry skies;
And all that's best of dark and bright
Meet in her aspect and her eyes:
This mellowed to that tender light
Which heaven to gaudy day denies.

One shade the more, one ray the less,
Had half impaired the nameless grace
Which waves in every raven tress,
Or softly lightens o'er her face;
Where thoughts serenely sweet express
How pure, how dear their dwelling place.
-Lord Byron

Then Almitra spoke again and said, And what of Marriage, Master?
And he answered saying:
You were born together, and together you shall be forevermore.
You shall be together when the white wings of death scatter your days.
Ay, you shall be together even in the silent memory of God.
But let there be spaces in your togetherness,
And let the winds of the heavens dance between you.
Love one another, but make not a bond of love:
Let it rather be a moving sea between the shores of your souls.
Fill each other's cup but drink not from one cup.
Give one another of your bread but eat not from the same loaf.
Sing and dance together and be joyous, but let each one of you be alone,
Even as the strings of a lute are alone though they quiver with the same music.
Give your hearts, but not into each other's keeping.
For only the hand of Life can contain your hearts.
And stand together yet not too near together:
For the pillars of the temple stand apart,
And the oak tree and the cypress grow not in each other's shadow.
-Kahlil Gibran

It is the heart and not the brain
That to the highest doth attain,
And he who followeth Love's behest
Far excelleth all the rest.
-Henry Wadsworth Longfellow

Fate, Time, Occasion, Chance, and Change? To these
All things are subject but eternal Love.
-Percy Bysshe Shelley

Life without love is like a tree without blossoms or fruit.
-Kahlil Gibran

Shall quips and sentences and these paper bullets of the brain awe a man from the career of his humor? No; the world must be peopled. When I said I would die a bachelor, I did not think I should live till I were married.
-William Shakespeare

Had I the heaven's embroidered cloths,
Enwrought with golden and silver light,
The blue and the dim of the dark cloths
Of night and light and the half-light,
I would spread the cloths under your feet:
But I being poor have only my dreams;
I have spread my dreams under your feet;
Tread softly, because you tread on my dreams.
-William Butler Yeats

I could not tell fact from fiction
Or if my dream was true
The only sure prediction
In this whole world was you . . .
-Maya Angelou

So, fall asleep love, loved by me. . . .
For I know love, I am loved by thee.
-Robert Browning

Hope is a thing with feathers
That perches in the soul
And sings a tune without words
And never stops at all.
And sweetest, in the gale, is heard
And sore must be the storm
That could abash the little bird
That keeps so many warm.
I've heard it in the chilliest land
And on the strangest sea
Yet, never, in extremity
It ask a crumb of me.
-Emily Dickinson

...let baser things devise
To lie in dust, but you shall live by fame;
My verse your virtues rare shall eternize,
And in the heavens write you glorious name:
Where, whenas Death shall all the world subdue,
Our love shall live, and later life renew.
-Edmund Spenser

...Alas,
We loved, sir -- used to meet:
How sad and bad and mad it was --
But then, how it was sweet!
-Robert Browning

To see a world in a grain of sand
And a heaven in a wild flower
Hold infinity in the palm of your hand
And eternity in an hour.
-William Blake

Twice or thrice had I lov'd thee,
Before I knew thy face or name;
So in a voice, so in a shapeless flame
Angels affect us oft, and worshipp'd be;
Still when, to where thou wert, I came,
Some lovely glorious nothing I did see.
But since my soul, whose child love is,
Takes limbs of flesh, and else could nothing do,
More subtle than the parent is
Love must not be, but take a body too;
And therefore what thou wert, and who,
I bid Love ask, and now
That it assume thy body, I allow,
And fix itself in thy lip, eye, and brow.
-John Donne

Trust thou thy Love: if she be proud, is she not sweet?
Trust thou thy Love: if she be mute, is she not pure?
Lay thou thy soul full in her hands, low at her feet;
Fail, Sun and Breath!--yet, for thy peace,
She shall endure.
-John Ruskin

Somewhere I have never traveled,
Gladly beyond any experience,
Your eyes have their silence:
Something in me understands
The voice of your eyes is deeper than all.
-e. e. cummings

And if I can't be with you I would rather have a different face
And if I can't be near you I would rather be adrift in space
And if the gods desert us I would burn this chapel into flames
And if someone tries to hurt you I would put myself in your place.
-Neil Finn

What is there in the vale of life
Half so delightful as a wife,
When friendship, love, and peace combine
To stamp the marriage bond divine?
-William Cowper

With thee conversing I forget all time,
All seasons and their change, all please alike.
-John Milton

-- , I give you my hand!
I give you my love more precious than money,
I give you myself before preaching or law,
Will you give me yourself?
-Walt Whitman

Stone walls do not a prison make,
Nor iron bars a cage;
Minds innocent and quiet take
That for an hermitage;
If I have freedom in my love,
And in my soul am free,
Angels alone that soar above,
Enjoy such liberty.
-Richard Lovelace

Mine ear is much enamoured to thy note;
So is mine eye enthralled to thy shape,
And thy fair virtue's force perforce doth move me
On the first view to say, to swear, I love thee.
-William Shakespeare

There has fallen a splendid tear
From the passion-flower by the gate.
She is comming, my dove, my dear;
She is comming, my life, my fate;
The red rose cries, "She is near, she is near,"
And the white rose weeps, "She is late,"
The larkspur listens, "I hear, I hear,"
And the lily whispers, "I wait."
-Alfred, Lord Tennyson

Marriage is like a golden ring in a chain, whose beginning is a glance and whose ending is in eternity.
-Kahlil Gibran

There be none of Beauty's daughters
With a magic like Thee;
And like music on the waters
Is thy sweet voice to me.
-Lord Byron

Did my heart love 'til now? Forswear it sight, for I never saw true beauty till tonight.
-William Shakespeare

your slightest look easily will unclose me
though i have closed myself as fingers,
you open always petal by petal myself as Spring opens
(touching skillfully, mysteriously) her first rose
-e. e. cummings

If thou must love me, let it be for nought
Except for love's sake only. Do not say,
I love her for her smile ... her look ...
her way
Of speaking gently -- for a trick of thought
That falls in well with mine, and, certes, brought
A sense of pleasant ease on such a day --
For these things in themselves, Beloved, may
Be changed, or change for thee -- and love so wrought,
May be unwrought so. Neither love me for
Thine own dear pity's wiping my cheeks dry,--
A creature might forget to weep, who bore
Thy comfort long, and lose thy love thereby!
But love me for love's sake, that evermore
Thou mayst love on, through love's eternity.
-Elizabeth Barrett Browning

Pains of love be sweeter far than all other
pleasures are.
-John Dryden

Love seeketh not Itself to please,
Nor for itself hath any care;
But for another gives its ease,
And builds a Heaven in Hells despair.
-William Blake

So dear I love him that with him, all deaths I could endure. Without him, live no life.
-William Shakespeare

All thoughts, all passions, all delights,
Whatever stirs this mortal frame,
All are but ministers of Love,
And feed his sacred flame.
-Samuel Taylor Coleridge

To me, fair friend, you never can be old
For as you were when first your eye I eyed,
Such seems your beauty still.
-William Shakespeare

What I do and what I dream include thee, as the wine must taste of its own grapes.
-Elizabeth Barrett Browning

But to see her was to love her, love but her, and love her forever.
-Robert Burns

Come when my heart is full of grief,
Or when my heart is merry;
Come with the falling of the leaf
Or with the redd'ning cherry.
-Paul Laurence Dunbar

'Tis sweet to know there is an eye will mark
Our coming, and look brighter when we come.
-Lord Byron

Look not in my eyes, for fear
They mirror true the sight I see,
And there you find your face too clear
And love it and be lost like me.
-A. E. Housman

Thou wert my joy in every spot,
My theme in every song.
And when I saw a stranger face
Where beauty held the claim,
I gave it like a secret grace
The being of thy name.
And all the charms of face or voice
Which I in others see
Are but the recollected choice
Of what I felt for thee.
-John Clare

My face in thine eye, thine in mine appears,
And true plain hearts do in the faces rest;
Where can we find two better hemispheres,
Without sharp north, without declining west?
Whatever dies, was not mix'd equally;
If our two loves be one, or, thou and I
Love so alike, that none do slacken, none can die.
-John Donne

What love is, if thou wouldst be taught,
Thy heart must teach alone--
Two souls with but a single thought,
Two hearts that beat as one.
-Friedrich Halm

Just because I loves you--
That's de reason why
Ma soul is full of color
Like da wings of a butterfly

Just because I loves you
That's de reason why
My heart's a fluttering aspen leaf
When you pass by.
-Langston Hughes

O my luve's like a red, red rose.
That's newly sprung in June;
O my luve's like a melodie
That's sweetly play'd in tune.
As fair art thou, my bonnie lass,
So deep in luve am I;
And I will love thee still, my Dear,
Till a' the seas gang dry.
Till a' the seas gang dry, my Dear,
And the rocks melt wi' the sun:
I will luve thee still, my Dear,
While the sands o' life shall run.
And fare thee weel my only Luve!
And fare thee weel a while!
And I will come again, my Luve,
Tho' it were ten thousand mile!
-Robert Burns

Hereafter in a better world than this,
I shall desire more love and knowledge of you.
-William Shakespeare

Fame, wealth and honor! what are you to Love?
-Alexander Pope

Were I as base as is the lowly plain,
And you, my Love, as high as heaven above,
Yet should the thoughts of me your humble swain
Ascend to heaven, in honour of my Love.
Were I as high as heaven above the plain,
And you, my Love, as humble and as low
As are the deepest bottoms of the main,
Whereso'er you were, with you my love should go.
Were you the earth, dear Love, and I the skies,
My love should shine on you like to the sun,
And look upon you with ten thousand eyes
Till heaven wax'd blind, and till the world were done.
Whereso'er I am, below, or else above you,
Whereso'er you are, my heart shall truly love you.
-Samuel Daniel

We cannot kindle when we will
The fire which in the heart resides,
The spirit bloweth and is still,
In mystery our soul abides.
-Matthew Arnold

I'll be as patient as a gentle stream
And make a pastime of each weary step,
Till the last step have brought me to my love;
And there I'll rest, as after much turmoil
A blessed soul doth in Elysium.
--William Shakespeare

Our State cannot be severed, we are one,
One Flesh; to lose thee were to lose my self.
-John Milton

So shall a friendship fill each heart
With perfume sweet as roses are,
That even though we be apart,
We'll scent the fragrance from afar.
-Georgia McCoy

My heart is ever at your service.
--William Shakespeare

Unable are the Loved to die
For Love is Immortality.
-Emily Dickinson

Now you will feel no rain,
For each of you will be shelter to the other.
Now you will feel no cold,
For each of you will be warmth to the other.
Now there is no more loneliness for you,
For each of you will be companion to the other.
Now you are two bodies,
But there is only one life before you.
Go now to your dwelling place,
To enter into the days of your togetherness.
And may your days be good, and long upon the earth.
-Apache Blessing

They do not love that do not show their love.
-William Shakespeare

If a thing loves, it is infinite.
--William Blake

Thou, Julia, thou hast metamorphos'd me;
Made me neglect my studies, lose my time,
War with good counsel, set the world at nought;
Made wit, with musing weak, heartsick with thought.
-William Shakespeare

Love will find a way through paths where wolves fear to prey.
-Lord Byron

Doubt thou the stars are fire;
Doubt that the sun doth move:
Doubt truth to be a liar;
But never doubt, I love.
-William Shakespeare

O lyric Love, half angel and half bird
And all a wonder and a wild desire.
-Robert Browning

Earth holds no other like to thee,
Or if it doth, in vain for me.
-Lord Byron

Kisses are better fate than wisdom.
-e. e. cummings

That old miracle -- Love-at-first-sight --
Needs no explanations. The heart reads aright
Its destiny sometimes.
-Owen Meredith

So dear I love him that with him, All deaths I could endure.
Without him, live no life.
-William Shakespeare

They sin who tell us love can die;
With life all other passions fly,
All others are but vanity.
-Robert Southey

The face of all the world is changed, I think,
Since first I heard the footsteps of thy soul.
-Elizabeth Barrett Browning

I do not know what it is about you that closes and opens;
only something in me understands
the voice of your eyes is deeper than all roses.
-e.e. cummings

Love me, sweet, with all thou art,
Feeling, thinking, seeing,--
Love me in the lightest part,
Love me in full being.
-Elizabeth Barrett Browning

Upon that I kiss your hand, and I call you my queen.
-William Shakespeare

The sunlight claps the earth
And the moonbeams kiss the sea:
What are all these kissings worth
If thou kiss not me?
-Percy Bysshe Shelley

The first sound in the song of love!
Scarce more than silence is, and yet a sound.
Hands of invisible spirits touch the strings
Of the mysterious instrument, the soul,
And play the prelude of our fate.
-Henry Wadsworth Longfellow

Whoever lives true life will love true love.
-Elizabeth Barrett Browning

If music be the food of love, play on.
-William Shakespeare

I arise from dreams of thee
In the first sweet sleep of night,
when the winds are breathing low,
and the stars are shining bright.
-Percy Bysshe Shelley

There is not a breathing of the common wind that will forget thee.
-William Wordsworth

The more of my poor heart you take
The larger grows my heart!
And, since some target I must show
For Cupid's cruel dart,
Oh, if mine own you deign to keep,
Then give me your sweet heart!
-Edmond Rostand

Once he drew with one long kiss
My whole soul through my lips,
As sunlight drinketh dew.
-Alfred, Lord Tennyson

To wait an Hour -- is long--
If Love be just beyond--
To wait Eternity -- is short--
If Love reward the end.
-Emily Dickinson

O, thou art fairer than the evening air clad in the beauty of a thousand stars.
-Christopher Marlowe

I love thee, I love but thee
With a love that shall not die
Till the sun grows cold
And the stars grow old.
-William Shakespeare

Love! the surviving gift of Heaven,
The choicest sweet of Paradise,
In life's else bitter cup distilled.
-Thomas Campbell

Yes, Love indeed is light from heaven; A spark of that immortal fire
With angels shared, by Allah given, To lift from earth our low desire.
-Lord Byron

What's earth with all its art, verse, music, worth compared with love, found, gained and kept?
-Robert Browning

Long after moments of closeness have passed,
A part of you remains with me
And warms the places your hands have touched
And hastens my heart for your return.
-Robert Sexton

I sought for Love
But Love ran away from me.
I sought my Soul
But my Soul I couldn't see.
Then I sought You,
And I found all three.
-Unknown

Excerpts: From The Everything Wedding Vows Book by Janet Anastasio and Michelle Bevilacqua. © 2001 F+W Publications, Inc. Used by permission of Adams Media.