What’s In A Name…?
The farther I get and the closer I come I think
Changing your name >
More than pronouns, more than
Surgery, more than hormones more than
Clothing more than socialization more than
Passing—
A name is how
You refer to yourself
Internally
A name is how others reference you
In conversation and a name is
What you recognize
When they say hello
What’s in a name
Better question might be
What isn’t?
A name, albeit arbitrary
Carries more than just
Gender, sex, it carries history
Family, past present and potential future
A name is fucking everything
A name is
Your concept of yourself
And a word for its entirety
It becomes meaningful to those
Who know you even long after
You’ve passed from this world to the next
A name, at the end of the day
Is all we have.
Why did it take me so, so long
To decide on a name, and why did they all feel
So wrong?
Throughout that duration I felt
More overwhelmed than I have ever
“No one chooses their own name”
I kept saying.
It was more a burden than it was a blessing
And honestly
The name
Was the entire transition
Starting. None of the hormones
None of the pronouns
None of that helped
Until I finally had a name
To call home, that was big enough
For the both of us.
At the time I felt embarrassed
For how long it took me
And for how many I tried and for
How much pain choosing a new name
Caused me. “I must not really be trans
Because I don’t have a whole list of names
I’d rather have”
As if that means fucking anything I cannot even
Remember those feelings without laughing.
How preposterous.
How much pain will I feel for things
That I ultimately become proud of?
It’s like
Each time I come across a bump in the road
I wonder to myself
“What am I doing to create these potholes”
Fucking nothing bro
Everybody hits them, not everyone gets
A flat tire, and if you do—
It doesn’t mean anything about you.
You’re just a regular unlucky bastard.
It doesn’t make you some sort of
Half-trans imposter
To acknowledge that you didn’t enjoy
The whole journey without struggle.
Also, I guess these people exist
But for those of you who don’t struggle with anything
Maybe stop saying things like
Potholes don’t exist, when you’re just driving
In a different place, or perhaps even
Walking in a totally different circumstance.