Ruth Bavetta
The Final Choice
My husband speaks rapid Norwegian
into the phone. It's Ingrid again,
calling from Oslo
to say that Tante Rakel, who's ninety-six,
Tante Rakel who got in trouble
for talking back to the Nazis,
is being railroaded into a nursing home,
because she has tried to kill herself three times.
The State, in its infinite wisdom,
wants her to die more slowly.
Bio
Ruth Bavetta's poems have been published in Rattle, Nimrod, North American Review, Slant, Tar River Poetry, Spillway, Hanging Loose, Poetry East, and many others. She has published four books, and has work included in several anthologies. She writes at a messy desk with a view over the Pacific.