How wise I am to have instructed the butler to instruct the first footman to instruct the second footman to instruct the doorman to order my carriage;

I am about to volunteer a definition of marriage.

Just as I know that spousal discord requires means of copin',

I know that marriage is a legal and religious alliance entered into by a man who can't sleep with the window shut and a woman who can't sleep with the window open,

Moreover, just as I am unsure of the difference between flora and fauna and flotsam and jetsam,

I am quite sure that marriage is the alliance of two people one of whom never remembers birthdays and the other never forgetsam,

And he refuses to believe there is a leak in the water pipe or the gas pipe and she is convinced she is about to asphyxiate or drown,

And she says Quick get up and get my hairbrushes off the windowsill, it's raining straight in and he replies Oh they're all right, it's only raining straight down.

That is why marriage is so much more interesting than divorce,

Because it's the only the known example of the happy meeting of the immovable object and the irresistible force.

So I hope husbands and wives will continue to debate everything debatable and compatible,

Because I believe a little incompatibility is the spice of life, particularly if they have income and they're both pattable.

* Note: We (R & A) actually slightly changed the poem in order to remove a rather dated and (now) obscure reference in the third line. We also changed the last line, which originally read "…he has income and she is pattable." Welcome to the age of political correctness.