Like black script
Scrawled on the wall
Virtues
Dressed in drab
Symbols
Covering stone slab
This new illiteracy
Speaks volumes
Inhibiting me
I found you
Through signs
In damp
Subway stations
I read to you
The constellations
You wrote me letters
That elude me
I know the same words
We speak
The same vocabulary
Yet I taste illiteracy
Sounds push through
Your lips
Fingers run over
My hips
You struggle to tell me
Secrets you hold
I see script falling
From your mouth
letters
Drip
Drip from
Your lip
My Mind reaches out
Then your words
Scramble away
You say
We’re going through
A drought
But your words
I just can’t make
Them out
Then you ask
If I ever hear
A word you say
I stand defeated
By illiteracy
In a whole new way