Self Portrait with W
One might claim a double victory, or after the Roman Empire’s fall, a reclamation
from the slurred “b” and its subsequent reduction.
Survival of the rarely heard, of the occipital’s impulse.
The oak’s crook performs a similar function.
Shielding myself from adjuration, I contemplate the second family
root, weighted in weapons, in Woden, in wood.
Not rejection, but acceptance in avoidance.
The Japanese homophone, daburu, bears a negative connotation.
Original language was thought to be based on a natural
relation between objects and things.
Baudelaire’s alphabet existed without “W,” as does the Italian.
The recovery of lost perfection is no longer our aim.
When following another, I often remain silent.
As in two, as in answer, as in reluctance, reticence.
We share halves – one light, one shadowed, but both of water.
Overlapped or barely touching, still we complete.
* * *
“Self-Portrait with W” originally appeared in the Silver Birch Press Self-Portrait series in 2014, and was reprinted in my chapbook, The Circumference of Other, included in Ides, a one-volume collection of fifteen chapbooks published by Silver Birch Press and available on Amazon.com.
O at the Edges 
You always make me think–and feel–both good things. Thank you.
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That is all I could ever hope for. Thank you!
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Hey O at the Edges! I have been following you for a while. I nominated you for the Liebster Award… I really enjoy your writing and I believe others will, too. Check out the guidelines in my blog post: https://justlpoetry.com/2018/06/09/the-liebster-award-for-new-blogs/
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Thanks very much for honoring me, but I’ve elected not to participate in blog awards, as I simply don’t have the time to do them justice. I truly appreciate the sentiment!
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WoW
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Thanks, Derrick! Much better than oW!
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🙂
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Really nice poem.
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Thank you, Randy. Much appreciated.
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Thank you, Bob.
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Wow that was really something there aren’t any poets I know that have that Dylan Thomas flair!! Great poem
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You’re very kind! Thanks very much.
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