Named


I still don’t know why I laughed all those years ago
when you told me what your last name had been
until age eight when your parents split

Maybe because it lacked the snug precision
of the one I’ve always seen you in –
your name now a perfect black t-shirt and jeans
While the other seemed tweed-scratch
and bulky, musty with old country
Before I knew the man who brought it to Canada, at 18,
buzzed with the thrill of typing it under a newspaper headline
Who gave it to you, your brother and sister,
never guessing it wouldn’t take root in the new world

After you’d moved and everything settled
you got to make the choice: keep or change
Too young for loyalties, you just liked the tough snap sound
And your mom baked a cake, updated her records with a red pen

When the time came, you knew you couldn’t ask me
to abandon the name I’ve always known
But I never told you I was tempted or that, even now,
like a junior high girl practicing some future signature,
I test its delicious weight on my tongue