The Story of My Name

I followed a prompt to write a poem in which the first letter of the last word in each line, read downward, will spell out your name.

The Story of My Name

My older sister named me Jeffrey.

She got permission from Mom when she was expecting.

She named me after a fictional

character, the boy named Jeff on the old Lassie show, for

whom she carried a torch. Really.

I'm just glad she didn't name me Elvis.

Paul McCartney hadn't become famous yet.

I would have been named Paul if I had been born just

a few years later. Paul would have been an okay

name, but I prefer mine, to be honest.

I think it's a good name.

Mom wanted my middle name to be Tyrone, because

she liked Tyrone Power, the actor,

but some nun told her she couldn't name me that. Really.

Because we were Catholic, my name had to be a saint's name,

but coming up with another middle name was easy enough.

She named me John, after her cousin, even though he was no saint. - Jeff Barnes