Wednesday, February 17, 2010

My Name -Inspired

I was born Ana-Liset Mendoza

though I was suppose to be Josephina,

like grandma,

but they have hard lives.

And mama was mad at dad,

so I wasn't Catilina.


But I was never really Ana-Liset,

and I don't know what it's like to be Ana-Liset

except when someone young is trying to sound old,

and it always just sounds silly to my ears.


Sometimes I forget what my name really is,

that I am not just a liset, but Ana-Liset,

cause I don't really know what it's like to be her.

That girl with the hyphen,

so grand.

I always imagined her taller,

with darker eyebrows.


What does the hyphen mean anyways?

I don't feel like a combined meaning.

Or maybe I'm the noun:

active in more than one sphere,

but that doesn't sound right either.

Because how can I be in more than one,

if I don't even know what that one is?


Still on the first day,

when they call out that name,

that's not really my name.

I pause,

I think,

Oh me, my face says.

And I raise my hand

unsure

if I am me in the end.

6 comments:

  1. I really enjoyed reading this. I think you reveal something very personal in this piece and the effect it has is strong. I also often do not recognize myself when someone calls me by my first and middle name. This piece made it easy for a lot of people to relate. :)

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  2. This piece was really quite lovely to read, you captured a very personal part of you, and brought it to life so that the reader could understand exactly how you feel.

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  3. Wow, I liked this a lot. You really got in depth, right down to your soul it seems like.

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  4. I really enjoyed reading this. I liked how you took the idea of My Name from In Watermelon Sugar and made it your own. The idea being that a name doesnt mean anything and more importantly doesn't reflect who you are as a person. I can see this poem as an inverse in technique of My Name in that, in that piece, he compares his name to experience suggesting his identity is in the experiences that make him; meanwhile, in your poem you play with this same idea by slipping through different names, suggesting that names are meaningless as they do not represnt who we are as individuals and might seem almost foreign to us.

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  5. This is really cute. I like the soul-searching theme without a heavy, existential droning that a lot of questioning poetry can have. I like it.

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  6. I enjoyed reading this piece. It was clear to read, easy to enjoy, and the last line really concludes everything you say throughout the poem.

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