Yellow

Hysteria. Hysteria.
Melancholy. Melancholy.
Painted blues turn red.
Strips of yellow peel
and crack.
A mouse gnaws at night,
frightening the woman during prayer.
God, oh God.
When will the hysteria end?
When he says it’s done with stale breath or
when the blood on the thigh runs thin?
The mouse continues to crawl past midnight.

Writer’s Note: Inspired by the short story, The Yellow Wallpaper, published in 1892 by Charlotte Perkins Gilman.