Another thing facing extinction--cursive writing. Sigh.

                       Handwriting

They say the way you do anything
                    is the way you do everything
                                                  and so--

The hard lean of your letters,
                    their heads so ahead of their feet,
          is the same way zeal
                              yanks the weight of your good sense.
The diligent stretch of your ascenders,
                    anxious and watchful as guardian geese
                              over their huddled gaggle--
          is the careful way you keep your council.
And the way your descenders stop abruptly as ice picks--
          is the way you swallow your comebacks,
                    is the way you leave a room.
And the half-hearted distinctions
                              between your m's and n's
                                        or your u's and w's--
          is exactly the way your mind wanders and blanks
                    at any instructions.
I can see the pout in your put-out p's
And the flourish in your flightly f's
And see how you carelessly leave the back door ajar
                                       of every single s--
          for the verve of your dreams to slip out
                    like a sneaky house cat.
And the way your stories circumvent their point
                                        then loop back again--
                    is so like your o's bad comb-over.
And of course there is the roving eye of your i,
And see the meandering detachment
                    of your t's open arms.
And your elaborate capitals--
          such flamboyant drum majors
                    all pomped with epaulets and braid
          or divas in bustles and veils and trains
                              leading an entourage.

I see your thoughts drawn out across the page
          a little loose about their line--
The letters sometimes as languid and sprawling
                    as the thoughts themselves,
          but other times grumpy strangers
                              bunched inside a crosstown bus--
The spaces sitting between the words
                                       like so many awkward silences.

Brain to synapse,
                    synapse to muscle,
                                        muscle to pen,
                                                            pen to page.

Oh the loss when thumbs skitter across toy keyboards--
          the mirror of what's written
                              into what's written.