How can a heart break. A muscle, an organ, a lifegiver, a lifetaker. This chamber contracts and that chamber expands. This valve flaps and then that valve flaps. The whirl of the oxygenated blood, rolling like a rich iron river, an infinite river. Like a tide, rushing in and leaving a negative space behind in its wake, a whoosh. Moving from one place to the next, always in a hurry, with every destination in mind but never stopping long. Pushed forward with the thump. The synapses of millions of nerve endings, lighting up like heat lightning in the dark summer night. Silent. Present. Predictable. The multitude of cells, in a chorus, with tenors and altos and sopranos and each in unison, humming. They reverberate into a pulse then, distant, in a wrist, a leg, a temple. Like a drum, echoing around the edges of this body, a whole body. Breaking but not broken.