NAMES

As a child my mother knew all the original names:
Frances Gumm; Archibald Leech;
Julius, Adolph, Leonard, Milton and Herbert ...
The list, so far as I could ever tell, was endless.
Her own displeased her. It came to her used
The former property of her own mother --
Killed by an icy step and complications
Of giving birth three months early --
So she experimented. She had a library card
Made out to Jane. She thought of joining
All the Theresas in her family or becoming Isobel
Because a nearsighted girl once called her that.
She always intended to her own self to be true
Once she discovered who that was.