I HAVE an intimate relationship with both the powers, as well as the potential illusions, of Naming.

I was born with three names and I carried them for eight years. All three of them are from Spain, and of course, spelled out in the Spanish alphabet. In my youth (which played out in various states, but now I speak of Maryland) I grew to witness the reality that people could not pronounce my name.

Not even my teachers.

They were not alone in their confusion. I have memories of my own biological father speaking to me in that same language and being frustrated that I could not understand the sounds he made with his mouth.

In time, I did learn some of those sounds. And through that learning, found that the same light two people see at once can have two different names. To this day I remember someone pointing up at a light fixture above me. La luz, m'ijo....la luz.

When the movie All That Jazz came out in 1979, I decided my name would henceforth be "Jazz," and I told my friends as much. This confused my mother a bit when they called on the phone and asked me for me by...name.

Also at that age, I was legally adopted by a new father, and my birth certificate and social security card and all other documents were altered to show the new surname, which was not from the villa of Pedraza in the nation of Spain, but instead, from Ireland. The new name I was given and which I offered to all who asked was a name which was in no way connected to my blood or my lineage or my self image.

For years, I felt a surreal splitting as I wrote that name on my papers for school, on my artwork, on each and ever document the State deemed legal and proper. My pretend game and pretend name was one that the very highest powers I knew of deemed "true."

The splitting sensation remained all the years I used that name, as I identified enough with it to turn as soon as you spoke it while at the same time always feeling somewhat phony or as if I were engaging in a lie. My first name, being one not commonly heard in the location I was living, was often chanted in a mocking fashion by other children, who rhymed it with obscene or insulting English words. I changed this name before turning nine, and became "Jack," instead. I carried "Jack" for years. I went by the name "Jack" for a full decade. From the records showing my withdrawal from high school at 16 to the working papers I gained prior to that, I was this "Jack."

Also in that decade, I grew to learn my adoptive father had a deeply entrenched and insistent behavior of referring to certain groups of people by one word names. They were very powerful words to him and they carried powerful energy that I was taught to fear as well, and keep far away from, whether it be in emulation or physical proximity. I watched him, various times, initiate aggression or threaten violence upon people he tagged by those names. I never grew to fear those other people, though.

In my youth (which took place in the 1970s for the most part) I grew up in and around ashrams, and my family kept the exclusive company of the communities that practiced the teachings they themselves did. The teacher whose words filled my home for most of my life often spoke in parables. And one of his most used and to my way of thinking, most important stories was (is) of a thirsty person seeking to quench her/his thirst by admiring a photograph of a glass of water. In this way, though indirectly, he spoke of sublimation and illusion and symbolism.

In my teens I used various nicknames. These were not nicknames that fell upon me accidentally. They were names I once again decided upon and gave myself. I brought them to life with use, signature, tagging, drawing and total adherence...for a time. Before I moved on to another name.

Name changes came to represent changes in my life. Just as a warrior might shave his head or paint her face in preparation for battle; just as a scholar might add a stripe to her robe upon gaining a new title; or a practitioner of Tae Kwon Do might be given a new belt upon reaching a new level of proficiency, I would adopt a new nickname or new variation of one of the names I'd held legally as a way of signifying a new time and new aspect of myself.

In these ways, as well as others, I grew to experience an understanding as deep as the throb in my chest; I cultivated a knowledge that names are just that. They can never be a shortcut to actual knowing, though we too often treat them that way. Titles, labels, divisions, names; they are but sounds we make with our mouths. They are markers of intention, or belief—and will change, just as those underlying intentions and beliefs will. They float around and over us, handled and traded by us, but are never truly attached to us. Not like skin. Not even like fingernails or hair. More like clothes. And like clothing, labels and names can hide as much as they show.

In this time in America, language and labels are used no less than they were in my youth. People call themselves (and others) Straight or Gay or Short or Skinny or Republican or Democrat or Conservative or Progressive...and none of that really means much to me, in and of itself. After all, I've seen straight people cross straight lines. And in thinking about it, I've seen no difference between a Gay and a Straight person, or at least no difference you could rely upon remaining constant and mutually exclusive. I've seen people who call themselves "Fat" appear quite normal to me, or even rather thin. I've also heard people use "Fat" as "Ugly," and found those same people beautiful. I've seen Beautiful people as ugly as one could dare imagine. And many of these names cannot even exist without a comparison, one which is nearly always unspoken.

I've met "Progressive" people who reasoned with undeniably retrogressive mindsets.I've known Republicans who were repulsive to me, and I've also known Republicans who were deep human beings with soulful eyes and huge hearts. I've seen Democrats beat their wives and I've seen Democrats give up food for another person who was hungry. I've known Convicted Felons who were trustworthy, and I've known people with perfect credit histories and grades who would be a risky proposition and major threat if trusted in the wrong ways. I've heard mass murder called Freedom and secret surveillance hailed under the banner of Liberty.

These days we address the migration of many people into this nation we call the United States of America. I've known these people to be called Aliens and Illegals, and I've known them to be called Papá or mi hermana! or "my husband." I've seen self-named Patriots align with self-named Klansmen, and I've watched as mothers working long hours under horrible conditions were labeled Vermin and Invader. The names cycle and repeat and reappear. Like those children who make obscene and degrading rhymes of your name, but now with a more sinister tenor and consequence.

And so it is we also pit ourselves against so much of the world today, and too often our own leaders attempt to enlist our blind allegiance, our collective hatred, or our will to harm by using labels of their own devising. With nothing more than the repetition of those labels and what they believe the value to exist therein.

What should a name mean to me? What should a political party mean to me? What weight should a label have?

We stand behind these symbols, and too often consider them an unerring and constant expression of the essence within. In a world, in a place, on a plane where energy is wed to matter, spirit wed to flesh (our human self a perfect example of such a joining), use of symbols is a necessity. Even our body might be seen as a symbol of our own less tangible essence. But just as it can be dangerous to try and maintain an artificial and static state of that body, it is dangerous to fixate too long on any one symbol or trust in it completely. Doing so is not helpful or illuminating, and is in fact, blinding. And like a cage that allows no egress, it will soon carry a stench that chokes.

The ease with which a person can stop being aware of another person's humanity and cease seeking to know their essence, instead opting to see them as defined by a static and small idea of their own determination, is frightening. The harm we can do to another and to ourselves as a consequence is vast and laden with despair.

The knowledge that we all share important and beautiful aspects as well as mundane and despicable ones—despite what titles and labels we use to call ourselves by—is enlightening. The communion we can share and the good we can do each other as a result of this understanding is infinite and empowering and true.