Sol

Three letters, one small sun. Sol is Spanish and Portuguese for the star itself, a Latin word that never bothered to change much between Ovid and now. It's also a Jewish given name, short for Solomon, worn by uncles and jazzmen across the twentieth century. In Spain and Argentina it's girls' territory; in English it reads warmer and more unisex every year, landing at 819. The sound is blunt and bright, a coin in the palm. There's a whole cosmology packed into it, and yet it still fits on a luggage tag. Bright, brief, unembarrassed.