Featured Poem
Cursive is back in many schools even
in this age of keyboards. Sadly,
third graders are saying good-by
to the letters they grew up with,
the trusted stick figures of printing
that cross the page step by step
inside a crosswalk of reassuring lines.
Time is short, we tell them, they
must pick up the pace, merge letters
in a fast-flowing stream of ink
that crosses over itself in loops
and rolls even stunt pilots might be
afraid to try. Printing was more
my speed with its deliberate strokes
that were so easy on the hand
and eye—cursive was crime
in the making. Was it the pressure
to get it right that made my fingers
throttle the pen harder and harder
as it moved from left to right,
choking the life out of words,
leaving legibility hanging on
for dear life while the joy of writing
flatlined? Consonants, vowels,
capitals, even the friendliest of
small case letters—I killed them all,
tearfully at first but then with murder
in my heart. Maybe they should have
locked me up, kept me after school
copying away until all my letters
learned to play together. But they
never put the cuffs on and sent me
out into the cursive world anxious
when I signed my name, fearful
of the blank sheet, inarticulate
in a prison of poor penmanship.