widdershins

widdershins

southpaw, lefty
sometimes cack-handed
mollydooker, sinistral
moon- or shadow-handed
I push the pen
no calligraphy for me

I long for boustrophedon,
drive one line to the right
flow the next to the left
zigzag, like mind’s play

will hands write
in logographs
syllabary, impure abjad
or like this hand,
in alphabet?

each tunes 
the mind otherwise— 
if I were right-handed,
wrote in syllabary,
I wouldn’t be
who I am

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glossary:
types of writing systems:
abjad, impure: diacritical marks inform the vowels (Arabic)
abjad, pure: each symbol stands mainly for a consonant and readers intuit the          vowels from context (Hebrew)
alphabet: each vowel sound is represented by its own letter (English)
boustrophedon: one line written to the right, next line written to the left (Some historical languages tried this) (pronounced boo-struh-fee’-daan)
cack-handed: clumsy (British)
logograph: each symbol stands for a whole word (Chinese)
mollydooker: left-handed person (Australian)
syllabary: each symbol stands for a syllable (Japanese)
widdershins: left-handed, contrary to the usual course