Project: Poetry Prompt An Alphabetical Letter Poem

Z   Julie Marie Wade

Citadel of our best names—angsty Zooey & chatty Zarathustra,               wee Zaccheus & mighty Zorro. (Zebediah, of course, would                            place among them.)  Experiment in endings (A-Z), as in “where the A ends up,” the crooked        path               an A could take toward some arrival’s gate (zig-zag).    Or Z-pack: superhero strength contained in capsules.  Like the 7, crossed or uncrossed, mustachioed or not,               the Z with its dashing  good looks & flaming androgyny,  its                            cursive tail & tiger purr.  That Z, its maze of contradictions, shape-shifter & fortress of finality:                N’s topsy-turvy cousin, S’s more callous sidekick, The stuff of caped-crusader skirmishes: ZAP! &  ZOOM!  Enabler of interjections (think Wowie Zowie! think Zoinks!)                Symphonic doppelgänger shadowing xylophone & disguise.  The verbage of bees, buzzing all day in a hive.  Zeta or zed, its dialectical relatives, or the numeral 3,                 Z’s bodacious brother on its mother’s side.         Ambiguous, flirtatious, & worth 10 points on the Scrabble board,                 Z turns out to be quite the catch—zany, zesty, & remarkably                            well-read. But despite its zeal, Z can also communicate quietly, eloquent as an             ideogram.                 It’s raining, it’s pouring, the old man is snoring… How do we know? Just look at the rocket of Zs rising out of his mouth.