The Curse

Like an old "friend"

you always come back.

And I break.

Predictably, your menace

holds me in fear;

you always win

and I always lose.

I have no power in me

to choose.

I think of the end for me,

every single month.

I cannot cherish life

when you are on the hunt.

Without fail,

your evil prevails;

like a snakebite;

a scorpion sting.

Your unhappy reign

always takes me in.

Every month since I was a child

you visit me,

painful and wild.

I am not me,

though I try to pretend,

and you bend

my will to break.

Your thirst is slake,

and the world can never know,

as the madness visits,

how low,

how low

my heart can sink

into desperation.

My children bless me,

as you curse me.

A woman’s lot

is not

to complain;

but I pray for salvation.

Again and again

I bite my tongue

and wrestle civility

from the broken shreds

of my deep humility.

As you leave,

slowly I gather myself back

from where I melted

through the cracks.

I make me whole,

and pray, next month,

you'll have mercy

on my desperate soul.