Poem For My Daughter's Naming Day: Poem & Process

Poem & Process is an ongoing series: one poem, and reflections on writing it.

Poem For My Daughter's Naming Day

I want you to be happy, of course
but I want you to be sad too
joyful and heartbroken:
I want you to experience the fullness life has to offer
the depth and diversity of this being human.

I want you grieving and ecstatic
angry, and bored, and fulfilled, and surprised
and I want to be here for you through it
as you feel it and move it
cry it and scream it
dance it and walk it –
I want you to talk to me all about it
doing my best to welcome it all in you
as you laugh it out in breathless waves
or sit in quiet contemplation.

I don’t want you to be a good girl
or a bad girl
or limited by the weird word-label ‘girl’:
I want you to feel that you are an unbroken and authentic person
that whatever your inner world is
it is matched by how you show up in the outside one.

I want you to love fiercely
and know that real strength is not in closing your heart
but in remaining open despite the pain of being hurt.

I hope that you are empathetic
bold in knowing your desires
in asking for them to be met -
that you are respectful of boundaries
your own, and those of others.

I want you to find belonging
always here, with me
and in communities of people where you are profoundly loved
to know that you are part of humanity
this earth, this universe
uniquely you, and part of the whole.

I want you to find meaningful partnerships
people who go beyond just accepting you
but welcome you as you are
and love you for it
if partnership is what you want.

I want you know what you want.

I want you to be resilient in making your dreams real
that you believe there is no such thing as defeat
but what may look like failure
is really an opportunity to further grow
to flow into a deeper understanding
of being a human in this existence.

I want you to know when to stop listening to your father
who sometimes likes to go on a bit about the nature of being
and find your own path to being yourself.

I want you take after your mother
who is powerful, and wise, and fun, and patient
and so beautiful
so full of love for life
and love for me.

I want you to be full of love for me.

I want you to know that you are a sacred gift of a girl
that the universe has so generously given me
and that I give myself to you in return:
that you inspire me to further open my own heart
to do my very best by you
and be of service to you
you, who is the greatest good in my life.

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My partner and I recently organised a naming ceremony for our daughter, and I knew I wanted to include a poem for her. This sort of writing - for a significant public occasion, and one that is highly personal - always creates a lot of pressure in my body.

I feel this most in my head, with questions and worries bouncing around my brain like a multi-ball pinball frenzy. All these parts of me lighting up and activated as they are pinged: “what if it’s not good enough?”, “how can I say something properly meaningful?”, “my family and friends will hear this!”. Stressful!

So the first poem I wrote was very much from my thinking head: a deep dive into the nature of being, with fancy long words and extended metaphors. It’s ok to be honest, and I’ll share it someday most likely. But: it wasn’t right for the actual ceremony.

I wanted something with more emotion, more of the personal, and with a sense of bringing in ritual. After the hours spent wrestling the first one into shape, this second poem was much quicker and flowed out with ease. I felt emotional as I wrote it, and when I shared it with my partner before the ceremony welled up. A good sign I was in my heart, and not my head. With a few day’s distance, and rereading it today: I really like it.

On the day, the poem landed with the family and friends gathered to welcome our daughter and her name into the world. I got through reading most of it without crying - and, when the emotion became too much, managed to take a few breaths and continue. Afterwards, people shared that it made them feel emotional as they reflected on relationships with their own fathers - and I received some lovely, validating feedback about the intentionality and thoughtfulness with which I’m approaching fatherhood. Cue more tears all round!

In the end, it served the occasion. I hope it serves me, too, in this becoming and being a father. A reminder of my focus, my values, my self-knowing - in order to be as good a Dad as I can be.