My mother named me
for no good reason.
There was no fireman hero,
no reknown global leader,
nor an astronaut Stephen
setting his foot on the moon.
It wasn't even her stylist whom she honored
as he kept her trusted secrets.
The roulette wheel of monikers
whirred uninterestedly past
Michael
David
John
Robert
Mark
Mitchell
Glen
(and thankfully) Carl
and surrendered its last click
on the formal of Steve
with a "ph".
It was haplessly indifferent
in the way it came be.
A last grasp of titles
as they pushed her out
the hospital doors.
I have a friend whose name
was never in question.
He was a fifth,
as in William V.
The Ist was proud,
so proud that he named the IInd.
The IInd an heir,
so he named the IIIrd.
The IIIrd obliged,
and so the IVth.
The IVth weary from fighting
the previous I's
and hence, the V...
as in William V,
as in flavorless,
pomposity faded,
worn like a hand-me-down
dress shirt through five generations
bereft of shape and dignity and fit.
He wished he had his own name -
I did.
And I found my name
free to be
designed to the only son
my mom ever had -
to be as grand or plain
as I constructed it to be.
This one-size-fits-me tag
Stephen Dane Roberson
is the Ist
and only.
A name that I love
because it is filled
with all the stuff I put in it;
and that stuff is me...
a me I wanted to be when I grew up :-)
