Hearing Meira

For years I went by the name Shir Yaakov; now the name Shir Meira calls to me.

I was not given a Hebrew name at the time of my birth. When I first read from the Torah at the age of 13, I took on the name Shir Yaakov.

To create the name Shir Yaakov, my mother and I looked to the Yiddish names of my grandfathers — Shaya and Yankel. Shaya is a nickname — was it a shortened form of Joshua or perhaps Isaiah? We didn’t know. By the age of 12, I was already a songwriter and a poet, so Shir/שיר was close-sounding and fit me. Yaakov/יעקב is the Hebrew version of Yankel. I have a cousin Jack whose name is also derivative.

I only started going by Shir Yaakov in my early 20s when I was a ba’al teshuva/בעל תשובה, a “returnee” to the traditions of my Ancestors. Taken together, Shir Yaakov means something like “song of the supplanter” or “heel-grabbing poet.” Throughout the Jacob narratives in Genesis, he is wrestling — with his brother, his parents, his birthright, his destiny, and God. Yaakov goes through a powerful transition to become Yisrael/Israel — to gain the name of the Twelve Tribes he sires — but also continues to be called, and identify with, his birth name for the rest of his life.

I wrestled with “Yaakov” as well, sometimes insisting the names be said together — “Shir-Yaakov” — and at other times dropping it entirely.

I still identify as a shir/שיר, a song, a poem.

Alighting Upon Meira

Discovering my autistic identity was a profound reorientation. The light I am beginning to find emerges from a long period of disorienting darkness and grief. The Neurodivergence Paradigm continues to reframe my entire personal narrative, my relational awareness, and draws me deeper into intergenerational healing.

Two of my great-grandfathers were named מאיר/Meyer. Many of the details of their lives are lost, mired in mystery. But there is something in their very survival, and silence, to which I owe my life.

We considered the name Meira for all three of our children; it is the female form of the name Meyer. It means “illumined, lit up.”

Hebrew is a binary language with gendered nouns. While Shir is a name now commonly given to Israeli children of all sexes, Shir is a masculine word. The name Shir Meira breaks the rules of traditional grammar. As we alight upon new forms of language, our lives of song must continue to illuminate and liberate.

What gender is music?