THE TASTE OF HEARTS

She came in wide-eyed,

too clean for this place, 

smelling like rain and notebooks. 

A voice you’d expect to bless a garden, 

and cry  for a fallen sparrow.

The kind of girl who walks in dreaming,

and runs out wrecked.

She didn’t run, not that night. 

That night, she sang.

Her voice, low and lawless, 

all edges and ache. 

Like someone who ‘d tasted blood,

and liked it.

She didn’t play notes.

She unskinned them. 

Ripped melodies straight from the bone.

And the crowd? 

They looked Spellbound. 

Eyes glassy -

like they’d bitten into something

they were too afraid to chew. 

Not a saint. not that night. 

That night, she was a soul cannibal.

Some songs heal.  Hers hunted. 

I felt it in the ice bucket. 

In the floorboards. 

In the way she didn’t blink for three verses. 

She left the stage quietly, 

like she hadn’t just swallowed the moon,

and spat it out on fire.

Sipped her tea softly.

Lamb costume zipped up. 

But I know a predator when I hear one. 

A voice like that doesn’t sing of hunger.

It remembers  the taste of hearts.