NaPoWriMo #11 - No Regrets

National Poetry Month Prompt #11 (From ReadWritePoem) - The thing you didn't choose.
     Everyday we make choices. Some are small: English breakfast or Lipton? the highway or back roads? Some are more significant: convertible or mini-van? farmhouse or condo?
     Some choices lead us straight into the life we’re living, but for this poem, think about one of the things in your life you didn’t choose.

     Be concrete. Pick an object — something tangible* — and write your poem directly to it, as if you were writing it a personal letter. Explain why you didn’t choose it. What could things have been like if you had? Talk about what your life has become without it. See where the “confession” takes you.

*As an alternative, dig a little deeper and write your poem to a person you left behind.


No Regrets

When I was seventeen and foolish,
I would have gone with you
To California –
just to escape the demons
my parents possessed.
Thank God, you didn’t ask.
Although you really loved me,
My heart belonged to him,
and always would…
Your absence a reminder
of all he was
and all you lacked.
A dozen long stemmed roses
announced your return…
futile attempt to win me back;
a battle you could never win.
I believed in ever-after.
You believed in now…
This alone would be our doom.
I married him.
I never once looked back,
unlike you.
Move on…
Choose happiness.
I did…
Decades later now–
Still no regrets.

©Bridget Nutting, 2010