Differences

A marriage is a strange thing to be planning
Or, I should say, a wedding. Marriage, less.
After all, a marriage plans on spanning
Decades of future life, but weddings press
All their activity into a week,
A day, an afternoon, a moment's bliss
And by constant compression ever seek
To push a year into a single kiss.
A marriage is a harder thing to do,
But has a lifetime in which to be done;
A wedding is a massive much ado
And barely lasts the transit of a sun.
To plan a wedding is thus full of fear
While marriages are calmer, year by year.