Dracula has her period (a poem)
Tiana Hennings

I wake and I’m frothing at my mouth.
When you wake and don’t have enough blood,
sparrows outside sound louder than usual.
Everything seems a little more blatant than usual.

I wonder what it’d be like to hold the sparrow
against the edge of my mouth, with its smooth feathers
gracing my teeth, politely fluttering, as I contemplate a chomp –

Ha – I’m sorry, I’m not actually like this.

But I do walk in the dark sometimes. Like I am now.
Have you ever woken to be replenished in the pale moonlight like this?
I have. I am. Have you ever chosen the 3:00 a.m. crawl to the rest of the house?
3:00 a.m. red eyes are locked and loaded, have you ever said
to night shadows, “You’re never getting rid of me.”? Like me?

 I’m usually not. Like this.
But tonight
I’m walking into the dark, and if you’re standing there, I’d ask,
with hands over your face, “where is my blood?
And why does my blood leave my body like dying warriors falling
from cliffs at the end of horrendous battle,
using their swords to scrape and hold onto the edges
in a last-ditch attempt at…surviving?”

 But right now I crawl to cupboards
after a few hours on a tile floor and
I’ll tell you and all the night shadows, “go away or I’ll
grab you too, share with you the essence
of oceans in pants, baby.”
And if you brought home garlic earlier, I’ll caustically say
that the CDC told you to throw them out. 
Because. There’s a Salmonella outbreak. In garlic.
Why would you bring them? And I’d hysterically cry ‘cause, y’know, garlic. 
I am a walking pain of a woman in a night shirt that doesn’t fit me tonight
and I’ll ask you to remember when you played with your
friends in the scorching sun and when you were thirsty and you wanted tap water so bad,
you ran to your mom and I’ll say it’s kinda like that but your underbelly is opening at the same time. 

And I’d get on my knees and yell, “Of course! Of course the ability to create
a living being from the blood of my body comes with the price of this pain. This loss.
I’m not usually like this. But just after every full moon, I am undead.
I am Dracula.

And so for this once please appease me?
Where is my blood? I need it.”

And in a few hours, I’ll go to work.
And sit at my desk, pleasantly.
And the sparrow will be outside my window. Still alive.