She shuts off the alarm and tumbles out of bed onto the floor,
head down, hands together.
“Dear God,
thank you for today,
and yesterday,
and all my days before.
thank you for my family
and my friends,
Amen.”

With wobbly knees,
she falls to the edge of her bed,
lifts up her shirt
and stabs the needle in her stomach.
The first of her many potions.

The bruises left behind are merely temporary
as opposed to the scars running across her chest
and the lumps in her left lung.
 
A precious pill popped after breakfast
and three more after lunch.
Her days move quicker
than the poisons in her veins.

Her solar hope for a new day sets,
making room for the beaming crescent
of the night.

“Dear God,
thank you for today,
and yesterday,
and all my days before.
thank you for my family
and my friends.
thank you for my medicine
Amen.”