The pupils of the eye become smaller as we age, shrinking to a mere third of their robust, youthful size. You knew this, even if you were not aware of the vanishing look in your grandmother’s window, the reptilian ooze of warm blood over the cliff. Open wide. Please. Open wider, so that we might forget the collapsing, the narrowing portals of grace, the cold neutron stars, in to which we are crushed. In this gaping sun filled array of gently swaying green, wide opening pink petals, and blue azulejo sky, I lament the constriction of your pupils more fervently…

When I would see her thin chart full of medical fluff perched upon the door I’d take a deep breath and relax before heading in. Hers were easy visits. Colds, allergies, acne. Sometimes we’d end her appointment talking about her college. Had she picked a major yet? Did she lead the soccer team in goals this year? But as I opened the door to the examining room that day I could smell the bottled air within was tainted with misery. Tears, snot, and even her cold sweat drifted in the small space, and as I sat down there was really…

“And your mother, how is her health?” I asked the cheerful young woman who had come in for a physical examination. She was draped in a blue paper gown under which her naked alabaster skin seemed translucent. Her branching veins coursed like roots close to the surface as they returned indigo blood to the warmth of her core. She smiled, albeit woefully. “My mother actually died several years ago. She had a brain tumor… glioblastoma multiforme it was called.” I stopped writing and looked up from the notes I had been scribbling in her chart. “I’m so sorry.” The young…