We'd been sipping wine at an outdoor café
in late afternoon light, my friend and I, our words

making light of whatever they touched, two flies
on the rim of a glass, talking as if the sky admired us.

Then out of the skateboards, bass thrum and laid-on horns
of jammed traffic, a woman appeared beside us,

set down her canvas bags, and the way her fingers flew,
it was clear she was deaf, signing a kind of shriek

at the street, at the cars and the awning over us,
which I saw could any minute collapse.

Small cross at her neck, short hair flecked with gray,
smudged glasses sliding down her nose,

the woman leaned in, flicked her hands toward my face,
so I looked up, away, then back, and had to shrug,

"What? I don't understand." Staring at me,
she conked her head three times with the heel of her hand,

and who couldn't understand that?-
bang against the world's bony ears,

whack to shake something loose,
tell the Furies, "Back off, settle down."

The light changed, she gathered up her loose
handles and straps, stepped wordless into the glint

of bumpers and hoods. In her wake we watched
light drain from our glasses under the thinning sky,

watched her move through sirens, skate clatter, taxis,
snatches of rap, and what could we say

that wouldn't leave everything inside her
unheard?