The Choice
Patricia Thrushart
The irony of choosing this over heaven—
this life of bone and blood; aches,
misses, mistakes; fleshy
covenants made and broken,
then made again; moments
of fleeting peace or petty
conflicts, of waning innocence
with wisdom hard-won;
the eternal optimism that
the Divine is waiting for you as if
you belong there and should never
have left in the first place,
but had no choice
as surely as dark briny oysters close
around a glowing, gritty pearl.
Patricia Thrushart has published two books, Little Girl Against The Wall, and Yin and Yang. Her work appears regularly in The Watershed Journal, a regional literary magazine of Northwestern Pennsylvania, and on the websites Dark Horse Appalachia and North/South Appalachia. Her poems have been published in Tiny Seed, The Brookville Mirror, Clarion University’s Tobeco, The Avocet, Still Point Arts Quarterly, The Pittsburgh Post Gazette, The Indiana Gazette, Feminine Collective and The Pennsylvania Poetry Society’s Magazine PENNESSENCE. She is an active member of the local writers’ community, presenting workshop sessions and participating in live poetry readings.