Signature

My name scrawled across the page,

like me, is old, so changed from

Mrs. Bailey’s 4^th grade cursive taught,

practiced, rehearsed, neat and mastered script

grown tired in recent years passing,

a pen running letters together, squeezed illegibly,

and a touch of lazy perhaps, usurped

by overuse, misuse, disuse, the clatter

of keys in fingers’ easy reach of letters handy

or silent keyboards tapped, transferring words

to a printer’s exactness, clear and self-corrected,

a signature obsolete, lost and unread, unreadable

scrawl across a page, old and tired.