Ive been playing around here with some slightly unorthodox methods to really put an edge on a knife.
The first tried was 3 blocks of hard maple 1" X 3" X 6" sanded flat to each other working between the 6 sides. I then coated one with fine lapping compound ( 400 grit) one with yellow diamond, and one with red rouge. The 400 grit sharpened quick and nice with a slight pattern from the grit. But very sharp edge. The yellow diamond refined the finish even finer and no knicks or roughness felt when drug along edge of finger nail. The red rouge was the last tried it produced a true mirror edge that was extremely sharp. Never felt it cut arm hair when tried.
Last was a piece of aluminum with typing paper glued to it 4 layers thick with rubber cement used the last 2 abrasives on it and again a truly smooth sharp edge with no burrs
I have used a red copper block ground flat with compounds for years to finish an edge.
The above were how we polished tooling in the shop when it was required. Rosewood was the preferred wood there but any close grained hard wood does good. The wood holds the compound well and a little water or light oil rejuvenates it. Yesterday I did 8 kitchen knives with out retreating them.all came out razor sharp. Rven a couple exacto blades got done