[Creative Nonfiction | Issue 10]

Emily johnson

bride in a bombed house

There is a photograph of the bride on her wedding day. Her home in London was bombed during
the Blitz in 1940. She is walking with her father, cradling a large bouquet of flowers. Another
woman (her friend? sister?) waves sardonically from a shattered window. Ever since I saw it,
probably on some Reddit thread, entitled “interesting as fuck”, I carry the sense of the image,
like the bride’s bouquet, gingerly and with care.

For a time, I used the photograph as a measure for my own existential dread, as a way to
convince myself of my own resolve, whether founded on revenge or rage. I considered it a
perfect image of protest. In those instances, I was the bride, walking towards my fate or with my
faith, stepping over the debris of the house that was standing yesterday. My thoughts as narrow
as the path cleared for my procession.

In another way, I was bothered by the singular determination, the indignant habit of living, the
will to have and to hold. We are in control of nothing else but. We watch systems brought to
their knees, and buildings brought to their foundation, and we find ourselves play-acting the
paradox of upholding everything that has shepherded us to this moment. Carrying us along with
unfathomable conduct, cresting and then receding enough for us to catch our breath. Our taxes,
the men in authority, our indefensible reasoning for war- all meaning depends on the ritual of the
bride. The care we find for our own, but find impossible to extend. Because if not for our own
clutching customs for love, for what are we taking, seizing?

The lace itches against her exposed collarbone, a possession of the state, our corroboration of
innocence. Keep her and her gown pristine, eyes forward, lips mouthing, “it’s not my place to
say” and “this is mine to have” and “I deserve this”. Don’t look, don’t look, don’t look.

The wreckage is veiled now. I’m still supposed to be upright. I look at the photograph and I
wonder if the bride considered herself at the mercy of or complicit with the broken bricks, her
something borrowed, the sins where she said nothing.

Image Source

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About the author

Emily Johnson is a high school special education teacher from Massachusetts. She has been published in Monkeybicycle.