Sunil Iyengar

The Omission

If no one has any questions, we’ll proceed.

The wedding had been marred—an altercation

at the rehearsal dinner. Seems Joe Lydoff,

in a dry run of a wet toast, presumed

to read a list of Stephen’s paramours.

More like a list of grievances it struck

everyone in the banquet hall. Close friends,

none closer than Joe, beamed in recognition

only to check themselves abruptly. Clare,

proud Clare, avoided looking at her parents.

She knew the names too well, but hadn’t known

just who would be excluded. Not many,

it so happened. But one would not let go

of the omission. Rosie Langeford

stomped down the aisle to Joe there on the dais,

and right before he capped the litany

with words like “now, nobody ever could

match up to all these triumphs but ole Clare—“

she (Rosie) flung the contents of her wineglass

into his face. 

            Which set the whole thing off.

Roger got up—as he was Rosie’s husband—

and gently pleaded. Even he could not,

however, brook the inventive nouns that flowed

from Joe’s contorted lips. So Roger made

to the front, all-deliberate-like, as if

about to broker peace, only to deck

Joe outright. Not that he was in the mood

to countenance his wife’s implicit boast—

and so, the second target of his wrath was

Rosie herself. He jabbed her here and there

until she did that guttural sobbing thing,

with catches in the throat and every word

a broken chest-heave. This was just too much,

finally, for the groom. So Stephen lunged 

forward, and—well, you know the rest. Clare bowed

her head in silence, which was rare to see

someone as loudly secular as she

do in a social gathering. But it wasn’t

social at all, this one. It came down to

a list of individuals: Stephen, Clare,

Rosie and Roger, and Joe, who, to avoid

controversy, had made one last omission

from the list-reading. 

         His own self? 

                               Why, yes.

My client asks for suitable redress.

Sunil Iyengar lives outside Washington, D.C. and writes poems and book reviews. He is the author of a poetry chapbook, A Call from the Shallows (Finishing Line Press), and editor of The Colosseum Book of Contemporary Narrative Verse, which Franciscan University Press will publish in the fall of 2025.