1. Read the poem 

2. Do your own reflection on it, noting what it inspires in you

3. Feel free to use your own reflection as your prompt or…

4. Use the selection of prompts below the poem

5. Pick one that inspires you and write (feel free to use only one or write several poems using different prompts) or…

6. Don’t use any of the provided prompts and follow your inspiration from wherever it comes

Offering

Here, take this palm full of raspberries 
as my gift. It isn’t much 

but we’ve often said our needs 
are simple, some quiet time 

alone on the patio 
in the cool morning, coffee, 

a few words over the newspaper.
I’ve rinsed these berries 

so you can tumble them 
right into your cereal, one minute 

on the vine, the next in your bowl, 
my hand it to your mouth. 

Let’s say my words were as simply 
sweet as these berries, chosen 

as carefully, plucked and held, 
and delivered as perfect 

morsels of meaning. Not 
what you hear, which is never 

what I mean to say. Will you take 
these berries? Will you feel their weight 

on your tongue, taste their tang 
as they slide into you, small, bright, honest: 

the only gift I have to give?

By Albert Garcìa
https://www.poetryfoundation.org/poets/albert-garcia

Note: Next Read Around is:
April 30, 2021 at 4:00 PM PST

My Thoughts

Whether we are writers or not, we all have moments when we hope that our words will hit the mark, that some deeper morsels of meaning will be taken in by another. So much of our conversation is surface chatter: a way of connecting to, or passing time with, others. Chit-chat is often enough and can be sublime in its own way. Albert Garcia’s poem, Offering, hints at the difficulty in truly conveying what we mean. Oftentimes, getting beyond the chit-chat to a deeper conversation is a challenge. And when the opportunity arises, we may not know how to convey what we mean, grappling with carefully chosen words that do not hit the mark. We have all had those times when what we said was not what we meant, or what we wished to say, or when what we said was misconstrued and resulted in troubling misunderstandings.

Garcia suggests a profoundly different intention to a communication: as an offering, which may be the best we can do. Words may never really express what we mean and the deeper meaning may be best conveyed metaphorically or through some gesture or action, as it is in the poem. Garcia depicts an everyday intimacy between two people who can simply sit together and share quiet time, enjoying a breakfast ritual of coffee, cereal, and reading a newspaper punctuated by a few scattered comments and occasional dialogue. It could be easy to take that time for granted, to take each other for granted. But in a most touching way, Garcia describes the offering of rinsed berries for his partner’s cereal as a metaphor for the way he wishes to offer his words and the way his words could be received. What if we spoke our words as an offering and gave them as carefully chosen gifts, gifts which must be taken in and digested to be truly received? I believe a good poem does just that for those who are nourished by it.

Albert Garcia Is another Sacramento Poet and once served as Vice President of Sacramento City College.

Prompt Menu

1. Write a poem about the spirit of offering: how does “offering” form in you? Is it different, in your experience, than “giving?”

2. Think of a time when you made a heartfelt offering in some small gesture, caring act, or simple gift, feeling that it wasn’t much; but was the best you could do or the only gift you could give; or think of a time when someone did so to you. Describe the experience.  You could use the prompt: “It’s not much, but…”

3. The poet states, “We’ve often said our needs are simple,” and goes on to name a few that the partners share. Write a poem about your simple needs or the simple needs you share with another person.

4. Write about a simple act you have done for another, or another has done for you, with great care and attention.

5. Write a poem describing the imagined audience for your poetry. Is it a group of people or a specific person? Describe how you would like to have your poetry land in the ideal reader or listener.

6. Recall a time when you felt in a quandary to  convey something but did not know how; or felt the deeper meaning behind your words could not be expressed. Capture that moment in a poem.

7. What carefully chosen words would you like to give as a gift (to life, to people, to a particular person)?

8. If there was only one gift you have to give (generally or to some one), what would it be?

9. As usual, right about anything else that inspires you from the poem or from life.