'The life that I have is yours': Chelsea's love poem as she said her wedding vows (before partying till 3am)

By Daniel Bates In Rhinebeck

Perfect couple: Chelsea Clinton and Marc Mezvinsky exchanging their wedding vows on Saturday


Chelsea Clinton and her new husband read a romantic poem to each other as they said their wedding vows with the words: 'The life that I have is all that I have, and the life that I have is yours.'

Guests looked on in the late afternoon sunshine as they recited the lines by British poet Leo Marks.

It ended with them saying: 'For the peace of my years in the long green grass, will be yours and yours and yours.'

Chelsea, wearing a stunning £16,000 gown by Vera Wang with a silver beaded bodice around her waist that glittered in the glorious sunset, looked radiant throughout the ceremony.

And then when she and Marc Mezvinsky walked back down the aisle as man and wife it marked the start of a party to end all parties with guests, including 73-year-old former Secretary of State Madeleine Albright, strutting their stuff on the dance floor till well past 3am.

It was the perfect end to a perfect day, with Chelsea's parents ‘overwhelmed with emotion’ and hardly able to contain their pride.


Perfect day: Chelsea and Marc's big day is said to have cost around £3.2million while her Vera Wang dress came in at around £20,000


They had exchanged vows under a pristine white gazebo with a horseshoe of flowers over the entrance in the grounds of a stunning country estate in Rhinebeck, 90 miles north of New York.

And as befitting the American equivalent of a Royal wedding, not to mention the £3.2million bill for the event, the guest list to Chelsea’s big day read like one seriously exclusive red-carpet premiere.

Stephen Spielberg was thought to have attended, along with Barbra Streisand, Whoopi Goldberg and Tom Hanks. Ted Danson, Mary Steenburgen and Julianne Moore were seen in Rhinebeck over the weekend along with Mr Clinton’s half-brother Roger.


Proud father: Bill Clinton leads his daughter down the aisle in front of 500 guests who had gathered in Rhinebeck for the occasion


Naturally Chelsea’s parents, former president Bill Clinton and current US Secretary of State Hillary Clinton, were among the first to bag their seats.

She wore a fuchsia gown by Oscar de la Renta, an old family friend, whilst the groom wore a tuxedo designed by Burberry’s Christopher Bailey who also provided the ties worn by the groomsmen and Bill Clinton.

A visibly emotional Bill Clinton, who had lost 20 pounds in weight for the event under orders from his daughter, walked her down the aisle and could not stop the tears forming in his eyes as he gave her away.


The congregation: Friends and family of Chelsea Clinton and Marc Mezvinsky, some with white parasols to shade them from the afternoon sun, gather in front of the white rose-decked gazebo where the couple said their wedding vows


Sweet music: A small chamber orchestra can be seen to the left of the gazebo where Chelsea got married yesterday


Like clockwork: Buses at the front of the Astor estate, which ferried the guests to the ceremony in the gardens to the back of the building


Chelsea and Marc were friends as teenagers in Washington, and both attended Stanford University. They now live in New York, where Mezvinsky works at G3 Capital, a Manhattan hedge fund.

He is a son of former Marjorie Margolies-Mezvinsky of Pennsylvania and Ed Mezvinsky of Iowa, longtime friends of the Clintons and members of Congress.

The ceremony was conducted by a rabbi and a reverend as Chelsea, 30, is Methodist and Mezvinsky, 32, is Jewish, and included Marks' poem The Life That I Have.

It is believed to have been written about his girlfriend Ruth Hambro who was killed in a plane crash.


Idyllic setting: Chelsea and new husband Marc pose for photographs after getting married at Astor Courts, in New York state


The poem was featured in the 1958 film Carve Her Name with Pride about the war heroine Violette Szabo.

Shortly afterwards Chelsea’s parents released a statement saying: ‘Today, we watched with great pride and overwhelming emotion as Chelsea and Marc wed in a beautiful ceremony at Astor Courts, surrounded by family and their close friends.

‘We could not have asked for a more perfect day to celebrate the beginning of their life together, and we are so happy to welcome Marc into our family.

‘On behalf of the newlyweds, we want to give special thanks to the people of Rhinebeck for welcoming us and to everyone for their well-wishes on this special day.’

Hungover guests at the wedding revealed the party carried on till near dawn with ex Secretary of State Albright the most energetic dancer of them all.


Happy family: (left to right) Marc Mezvinsky with Hillary Clinton, his bride Chelsea and father-in-law Bill Clinton after the couple's wedding


Apparently she did not sit down once and partied all night with most of the guests, dragging people from their seats to dance with her.

‘Everyone was up for it’ said one guest and almost all the those attending including Bill and Hillary Clinton and the happy couple strutted their stuff.

The first dance performed by singer Jim Valli and his band was a Frank Sinatra standard, followed by a mixture of U2, Michael Jackson and Motown classics.

Such was the fun being had by all that the cake, made up of multiple layers of chocolate reaching 5ft tall, was not cut until midnight.


Glittering: Guests wait for a bus to depart from the Delamater Inn to go to the wedding


Merry guests made their way home and although the last bus back to town left at 3am, dozens were still partying the night away.

But there were also more sombre moments and when Bill Clinton walked his daughter down the aisle ‘there was not a dry eye in the house’.

Speeches from Bill Clinton, Marc Mevzinsky and Chelsea followed - hers was a deeply personal and moving account of how she met her fiancee and what he meant to her.

Guests were left lavender gift bags in their rooms which are thought to have contained expensive toiletries.

A male friend of Chelsea’s said: ‘I’ve been to a lot of high profile weddings all over the world and this topped them all.

‘On a scale out of 10 it was a 20.


Protection: A team of security patrol the Rhinebeck streets ahead of Saturday's ceremony


‘They thought of everything and at every stage we just felt like they were looking after us.

‘It was very warm, very personal and very intimate. There was a 20-piece band who were there until really late on.

‘We partied like crazy and I saw everybody dancing, Ted Danson, Bill, Hillary, everyone was loving it.

‘The real star of the show was Madeleine Albright. For a woman of her age she has so much energy, I think everyone was impressed!’ A female friend of Chelsea’s said: ‘The whole thing was very Chelsea-like. It was classy but not brash, sophisticated and elegant and just really well done.





Star guests: Ted Danson and Madeleine Albright, pictured in Rhinebeck on Saturday, both partied away till the early hours at Chelsea's wedding


‘Even on her wedding day she was going around and asking if people were OK and if they were having a good time.’

The security around the event was so tight that guests were not told until two days before the event where they would be staying.

The event was the culmination of months of planning which left nothing to chance and turned Rhinebeck, a picture-postcard perfect idyll of smalltown American, into a mini-police state.

The road to Astor Courts, the wedding venue, had been blocked off early on Saturday with neighbours receiving a bottle of wine from the nearby Clinton vineyards for their troubles - and the sky above was declared a no-fly zone by federal aviation officials.


Line up: limousines wait outside a hotel in Rhinebeck on Saturday morning


Secret Service agents patrolled the town throughout the weekend, stopping cars that looked even remotely suspicious - a caravan-style vehicle was flashed with blue lights and ordered not to even go down the road which led to the country lane where the wedding took place.the wedding was on.

Every single room in the town was booked out months ago for an ‘event’ and even the most clued up locals only found out for sure a fortnight ago.

One resident said: ‘The security around here was just insane. I live near where it is happening and they have had to give me a special pass to get to my house. I don’t mind though, this is putting Rhinebeck on the map.’ Others were just there for the spectacle.

Jacqui Denu, 65, said: ‘I took half a day’s holiday on Friday and spent seven hours down here on Saturday sitting by the main crossroads.

The wedding began at 5pm and guests not important or rich enough to fly in to one of the two specially set up helipads on site were ferried by bus from the Delmater Inn in town to the venue three miles away.

Locals hoping for a glimpse of the bride were left disappointed and had to settle for Bill Clinton and Ted Danson, who both took a stroll around town.

The equivalent of £6,400 was thought to have been spent on each of the 500 guests and the vegan and gluten free cake cost £7,000.

Some £10,000 was even spent on the ‘Presidential style’ mobile toilet blocks.



source: dailymail