A LITTLE NIGHT MUSIC

Neurofibromatosis: barely a word,
especially now--more like a Greek dance
of vowels, sound whorling itself
around the neck of a vase. But the vase
is their daughter, Pampered asleep: cafe-au-lait spots
fleck a haphazard frieze on her buttocks, her back.

And under each tea leaf, they know now, each sepia
thumbprint, a tumor--nerve sheath's
tendril and vine, touched by the god of what chaos
into what kind of life? They've been to Delphi
and back, doctors asking the requisite questions--
the spots, have they increased in size? number?

changed shape?--and with each yes assuming
shades of expression ever harder to read.
What does this mean for their baby? The answers
aren't riddles exactly, just informed guesses--
What Might Happen If. Worst-case scenario:
the Elephant Man. Best-case, what they see

here, in late afternoon light: shadow-
dapples dancing to music no one can hear.
She sighs softly; turns, her hair
a black crinkle on sheets. Dreams lift
her lips in a smile. She's been fed into MRI's tunnel;
her brain-scan is clear. There will be no seizures.

They're grateful, must wait for whatever else.
He thinks of optometrist goggles, eye charts,
each click of the lens--Which is better,
this . . . or this?--rendering letters into
inscrutable shapes; she remembers the slide
tray's click in Art 26, follows

six geezers filling the screen, spilling
into a ditch. It's Brueghel, "Parable of the Blind":
beggars linked single file, a staggering
series of browns, grays clustered like half notes,
riding staffs downward in darkness. Eyes stare
skyward, scoured clear by leucoma, atrophy.

So much--too much--for vision. It's stamina, mostly.
He retrieves a loose juice bottle; she
unfolds a sleeper, begins easing it on.
In half-light, across the small treble of chest
curved by her breath, the soft beats of her heart,
dark shapes flush up, hover, hush down.