The hanged man swayed upon the gibbet, his tattered clothes and bare, blood-blackened feet swinging in a passing gust. I bowed my head as I passed, reminding myself that we all die; one day too, my heart would stop, and the stilling blood would gather somewhere and turn my flesh that same bruised color while all the rest of me faded to a color-wanting white. What sins had brought the man—or what virtues, for virtues are far more ruthless than vice—to the end of a rope, I cannot say, but say a prayer, for his soul and mine.
The Hanged Man
Tale Told 