Faint of Heart

Old Aunt Inga opened the door
to see the young man who’d come calling
for her daughter.
The young man, excited and nervous,
had just donated blood to the Red Cross.

Aunt Inga peered through her bifocals,
down
her
nose
at the faint and charitable man on the doorstep.

Inga saw the I-GAVE-BLOOD sticker on his chest,
now forgotten by the man,
and declared her approval in her boisterous Norwegian accent:
Oh, I see you’ve got a heart on!
and showed the flustered gentleman the way in to her daughter.