Hearts On A String


She had her
tools, oh
she
did,
an easy southern
way and the
angel
face,
a shape that
haunted
men's
eyes
and oh yes a
beautiful
set
of
hearts, all strung
together
on a
string.
She must have
had them all
or so
I
think, mine for
sure and
too
my
best friend, yes
a goner
before
I
knew he'd been
collected,
or
I
might have warned
the hapless
guy
but
it didn't matter.
Like I
said,
she
got them all in
her own sweet
time,
old,
young, in-between,
single, married
guys
the
easiest of course.
And she kept
them
all
up, spinning like
a juggler's
plates
til
she decided it was
time to let
one
fall,
delectibly shattered
into sharp
tiny
bits.
It started young,
seventeen, a
baby
boy,
adopted and seventeen
himself when I
knew
her,
though she of
course never
knew
him.
Before that a
cousin, an
uncle
too,
and at thirty-four
collecting
all
her
hearts on a string,
the sweetest
kind
of
revenge.