When they start to connect the signs
with things that they possess, doll, lip
or know, man, lamb, I see
how solemnly they are absorbed
in the exacting tale: Ann eats.
How about John?
In vain I look back for the moment
when this happened to me
the rapture or disaster of literacy.
I don't know if it took
or gave. I have been all my life,
I think, in love, betrayed
and literate.