The Picture

Above the mantle hung a picture

It’s brassy frame reserved and dignified

And it was under this that she lay

Lifeless, a parody of her former self

But her beauty still shone

And the painting, in it’s resiny magnificence

At once begun to darken and cloud

And the young lady,

it’s focus, it’s reason for existence

Seemed to melt into it’s shadows

Until all that could be seen was a dark swirl of colour

Where once beauty and vitality had lived

But those in the room took no notice

They’d seent he phenomenon before

Because the young girl that lay there so pale

Was only a link in the chain

Of a curse

That stretched through the centuries

And would go on for generations to come

For she was the first and only born

As her mother had been before her 

And hers before her

For only women were born into the family now

And each one was destined to die

Upon the birth of her healthy infant daughter

Who would one day marry and then seal her fate

Upon the marital bed