👍

*plucks at one’s heart strings

For some reason ngram doesn't help here, but without it I see many results for 'play' as well, although, admittedly, some are with (up)on/with and with a hyphen - 'heart-strings'
https://www.google.com/search?q=%22plays+*+heart+strings%22&client=firefox-b-d&biw=1070&bih=1179&tbm=bks&sxsrf=APq-WBvBsHlx9IfP6_kr6VeGy2eLDi-jLA%3A1650275833107&ei=-TVdYveWBpepgAag-pmoAg&ved=0ahUKEwi398DGrJ33AhWXFMAKHSB9BiUQ4dUDCAg&uact=5&oq=%22plays+*+heart+strings%22&gs_lcp=Cg1nd3Mtd2l6LWJvb2tzEANQtAlY7A1ggxJoAHAAeACAAW6IAc8CkgEDMy4xmAEAoAEBwAEB&sclient=gws-wiz-books

кстати, в русском есть также и "задевать (сокровенные/потаённые) струны души" и "дергать за струны души" - со слегка другим смыслом.

heat-strings,?

corrected...

https://books.google.com/ngrams/graph?content=plays+on+%2A+heartstrings%2Cplucks+at+%2A+heartstrings%2Cplays+%2A+heartstrings%2C+&year_start=1800&year_end=2019&corpus=26&smoothing=3&direct_url=t2%3B%2Cplays%20on%20%2A%20heartstrings%3B%2Cc0%3B%2Cs0%3B%3Bplays%20on%20the%20heartstrings%3B%2Cc0%3B%3Bplays%20on%20your%20heartstrings%3B%2Cc0%3B.t2%3B%2Cplucks%20at%20%2A%20heartstrings%3B%2Cc0%3B%2Cs0%3B%3Bplucks%20at%20the%20heartstrings%3B%2Cc0%3B%3Bplucks%20at%20my%20heartstrings%3B%2Cc0%3B%3Bplucks%20at%20our%20heartstrings%3B%2Cc0