Like the Nutcracker’s ludic wooden teeth,
the ivory keys turned amber at the edges. 
One fluted Doric piano leg
 
wobbles on its wheel. The well-wrought mahogany
beast is dark with age. The inside pieces,
cracked. It seems the damper action’s shot.
 
Sounds reverberate. The tuner fits the framework
back together. Like a surgeon who sews
a faltering heart, he says it can’t
 
be salvaged again. If Mother were still alive,
I might hear her play Malaguena,
several exuberant measures,
 
or the first few notes of the Moonlight Sonata. 
Then she arises from the bench. Flowing
toward the bathroom in a negligee,
 
she sings a coda in her off-key soprano:
Orchi Chornia—Dark Eyes. A sense of
the tragic. Her repertoire is done.