Non-religious wedding readings
Updated August 2026
Four secular wedding readings, each printed in full, each with the year it was published and the reason it is free for anyone to use. They name no faith and ask nothing of the room beyond attention, and every one of them is whole in itself rather than a religious piece with the religion taken out.
Under each text you will find who it suits, roughly how long it takes to say out loud, and the specific thing that goes wrong when people read it: the line that gets rushed, the word that trips the tongue, the pause that has to be held.
The readings
One is enough for most ceremonies and two is the outer limit. If you are choosing between these, read all four aloud, standing up, and keep the one that sounded like a person talking rather than a person reciting.
On Marriage
about 1 minuteThe most requested secular reading there is, and it earns it: it argues for closeness AND for two people staying themselves. Suits couples who married later, or who each arrived with a whole life already built.
Almitra asks the prophet to speak of marriage, and he answers:
You were born together, and together you shall be forevermore.
You shall be together when the white wings of death scatter your days.
Aye, 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.
Where this text comes from
Kahlil Gibran, The Prophet, first published 1923. Works published in the United States in 1923 lost copyright protection on 1 January 2019, which is the day this edition was released to the public-domain archive linked below. Only the 1923 text is used here, never a later edition or translation.
Checked against Project Gutenberg: The Prophet (1923 text, released 1 January 2019).
Reading it aloud
The trap here is the rhythm. Every line is built the same way, so a reader who does not vary the pace turns three beautiful stanzas into a chant. Break it deliberately: take the first stanza slow and warm, let the second lift a little, and drop your voice for the last three lines.
Land on "the pillars of the temple stand apart" and stop there for a full beat before the final line. It is the image the whole reading has been walking toward, and rushing past it wastes the piece.
What greater thing is there
about 20 secondsFour lines, one sentence, no religion, and it says the entire thing. The best choice when the ceremony is already long, or when the reader is nervous and needs something short they can hold.
What greater thing is there for two human souls than to feel that they are joined for life—to strengthen each other in all labour, to rest on each other in all sorrow, to minister to each other in all pain, to be one with each other in silent unspeakable memories at the moment of the last parting?
Where this text comes from
George Eliot, Adam Bede, first published 1859. Far ahead of the 1930 line, so US copyright expired long ago and the passage is free to reprint.
Checked against Project Gutenberg: Adam Bede, which records the work as "first published in 1859".
Reading it aloud
It is one sentence with four clauses, and the temptation is to gallop it. Do the opposite: place a small pause after "joined for life", then take the four clauses like four separate promises, each a shade quieter than the last.
Because it is short, print it large and hand it to the reader on a single card. Nothing makes a twenty-second reading go wrong like a phone that dims halfway through.
Forty years later, and at Eve’s grave
about 45 secondsFunny writer, devastating ending. Choose it when the couple wants something with a whole life inside it, and when you have a reader who can hold a room in silence for two seconds.
Eve speaks first, forty years into the marriage. The last line is Adam, standing at her grave.
It is my prayer, it is my longing, that we may pass from this life together—a longing which shall never perish from the earth, but shall have place in the heart of every wife that loves, until the end of time; and it shall be called by my name.
But if one of us must go first, it is my prayer that it shall be I; for he is strong, I am weak, I am not so necessary to him as he is to me—life without him would not be life; how could I endure it?
Wheresoever she was, there was Eden.
Where this text comes from
Mark Twain, Eve’s Diary, first published 1906. Published in book form by Harper & Brothers, well before the 1930 line, so US copyright has expired.
Checked against Internet Archive: Eve’s Diary, Harper & Bros., 1906.
Reading it aloud
Tell the room what it is about to hear before you start, or the last line lands as a puzzle instead of a punch. One sentence is enough: "Eve, forty years married, and then Adam at her grave."
Then leave a real gap before that final line. Two full seconds feels like an eternity to the reader and like exactly the right pause to everybody else. Say it plainly and stop; do not add "thank you" on the end of it.
I Am Not Yours
about 40 secondsA love poem with an argument in it: the wish to be lost in someone, and the refusal to disappear. Good for couples who are wary of readings that talk about two becoming one.
I am not yours, not lost in you,
Not lost, although I long to be
Lost as a candle lit at noon,
Lost as a snowflake in the sea.
You love me, and I find you still
A spirit beautiful and bright,
Yet I am I, who long to be
Lost as a light is lost in light.
Oh plunge me deep in love—put out
My senses, leave me deaf and blind,
Swept by the tempest of your love,
A taper in a rushing wind.
Where this text comes from
Sara Teasdale, Rivers to the Sea, first published 1915. Comfortably before the 1930 line, so US copyright has expired and the poem is free to reprint.
Checked against Internet Archive: Rivers to the Sea, New York, 1915.
Reading it aloud
The first word of the poem is a refusal, and readers often soften it into an apology. Do not. Say "I am not yours" straight, then let the rest of the stanza explain the ache underneath it.
The third stanza turns; it is the only place the poem raises its voice. Give it more air and a little more volume, and finish quietly on "a taper in a rushing wind".
Choosing and reading well
What makes a reading secular, rather than merely faith-free
Cutting the prayers out of a religious reading rarely works, because what is left has a hole where its argument used to be. A secular reading has to stand on something of its own: the weight of a freely made promise, the people in the seats, the plain fact of two lives being deliberately joined. Each of the four texts here does that, which is why they survive being read at a wedding where nobody shares a faith.
Watch for language that sounds neutral but is not. Elizabeth Barrett Browning’s famous sonnet mentions God in its last line, several classic "secular" choices are lifted from religious philosophy, and the well-known blessing that begins "Now you will feel no rain" is not an old Apache text at all but a passage from a 1947 novel, recent enough that we treat it as protected. If a couple has asked for nothing religious, read the whole piece through with that ear before you promise it.
Choosing between four good options
Length is the first filter, and it is more decisive than people expect. The George Eliot is twenty seconds and the Gibran is a full minute, which is a real difference in a ceremony that already runs twenty. If the ceremony is long or the reader is anxious, take the short one and let the officiant carry the weight instead.
Then match the text to the couple rather than to the occasion. Gibran argues for space inside closeness; Teasdale refuses to disappear into someone; Twain looks back across forty years; George Eliot simply states what two joined lives do for each other. Those are four different marriages being described, and only one of them is the one standing in front of you.
What we do not reprint, and why
These come up constantly and every one of them is still in copyright. You may read any of them aloud at your own ceremony; what nobody should do is reprint them in a program or on a website without permission, and that includes us.
- "I Carry Your Heart With Me"
The e.e. cummings poem about carrying someone’s heart inside your own (probably the most requested modern wedding reading in English).
Why it is not here: First published in 1952 and still in copyright. Reading it aloud at your own wedding is fine; reprinting it here, or in a printed program, is not.
Where to get it: It is in the collected poems, in print everywhere, and licensed reprints are available through the publisher.
- Neruda’s Sonnet XVII
"I do not love you as if you were a salt rose", the sonnet that ends with two people so close that one cannot tell whose hand is whose.
Why it is not here: First published in 1959, and every English translation in circulation is more recent still, with its own separate copyright held by the translator.
Where to get it: Buy a bilingual edition; the translation is half the poem, so choose the translator deliberately rather than taking whichever version a wedding site posted.
- "The Art of Marriage" and "Union"
Two staples of the wedding circuit: one a list of what a good marriage is made of, the other about two trees growing beside each other.
Why it is not here: Both are twentieth-century works by named authors and both remain in copyright, despite being circulated online as though they were anonymous or traditional.
Where to get it: Ask your officiant, who very likely holds a licensed copy, or seek permission from the publisher if you want it in the program.
- The "Apache wedding blessing"
The reading that begins "Now you will feel no rain, for each of you will be shelter to the other."
Why it is not here: It is not an Apache text and it is not old. It was written in 1947 by the novelist Elliott Arnold for his novel Blood Brother, and a 1947 work is well inside the window where United States copyright can still be running, so we treat it as protected. Presenting it as a Native American prayer is a misattribution we will not repeat, whatever it costs in traffic.
Where to get it: If you love the words, credit Elliott Arnold and seek permission for a printed program. If what you wanted was a genuine Native ceremony, ask the nation concerned rather than a wedding website.
Keep the readings with the rest of the ceremony
RiteBinder is the booking desk and the writing desk in one: the interview, the script, the readings, and a podium that needs no signal on the day. Free to start.
Frequently Asked Questions
- Can we use these readings for free?
- Yes. Every text on this page was first published before 1930 and is in the public domain in the United States, so you can print it in a program, read it aloud, or put it on a card without asking anyone. The publication year and the source we checked are printed under each one so you can verify it yourself.
- How many readings should a non-religious ceremony have?
- One is plenty and two is the maximum. A secular ceremony has fewer fixed elements than a religious one, which tempts couples to fill the gap with readings, but three readings in a row is where a ceremony starts to sag. If you want more voices involved, give people a role in a ritual or a toast instead.
- Why is Neruda not on this page?
- Because it is still in copyright. Pablo Neruda, e.e. cummings, Mary Oliver, and the wedding-circuit standards "The Art of Marriage" and "Union" are all modern and protected, so reprinting them here would be a small act of theft. You may still read them at your own wedding; what you cannot do is publish them, and neither can we.
- Does a secular reading have to be a poem?
- Not at all. Two of the four here are prose, and prose is often easier for a nervous reader because it does not demand line breaks be honored. A passage from a novel, a letter, or something a friend writes for you works just as well, provided somebody reads it aloud beforehand and times it.