The man in the wheelchair spilled
an alphabet
in front of our feet and then asked
for directions: “Which way
to the step show?”
his grimy index all the while
tracing individual letters, smudged ink,
as we followed his cue, spelling out
like a chorus of first-graders, shy
in the beginning, gradually growing
more confident, excited over
the long-forgotten craft of reading less
than words. “Which way to the step show?”
but we didn’t know, how could we
(grad students in English literature
overfed with language)
point out the right direction to the man
in the wheelchair,
who simply wanted to see
people dance.