Braille

Two dots wide by three dots high
A six dot block known as a cell
A cool little trick to encode 'u' and 'i'
But also, well, also the entirety of an alphabet along with the rest of human literature as well. 

Even though there's only 64 things that a cell can say
Together they were the facts and they were the fiction
A means of access to the culture of the day
Once the only lifeline for those with low vision

How odd it is, such a wonderous invention
Was, like sadly many things, born of war
Derived from Napoleonic means of night communication
Though rejected for being too complex at it's core

Step up Louis Braille, who took it, improved it
And then three years late, at age 15
Took the first Braille alphabet, and used it
To allow him access to a world he'd never seen

And though now Screen Readers have taken hold
I hope that Braille will still not be forgot
There is such beauty in the simple embedding of old
In which different worlds are encoded inside each little dot

***

I couldn't find a way to sneak it in, but it's apparently 200 years since the meeting between Charles Barbier (inventor of night writing) and the young Louis Braille in 1821 at the Paris institute for the blind.