How It Works

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

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

When Giving Is All We Have

One river gives
Its journey to the next.

We give because someone gave to us.
We give because nobody gave to us.

We give because giving has changed us.
We give because giving could have changed us.

We have been better for it,
We have been wounded by it—

Giving has many faces: It is loud and quiet,
Big, though small, diamond in wood-nails.

Its story is old, the plot worn and the pages too,
But we read this book, anyway, over and again:

Giving is, first and every time, hand to hand,
Mine to yours, yours to mine.

You gave me blue and I gave you yellow.
Together we are simple green. You gave me

What you did not have, and I gave you
What I had to give—together, we made

Something greater from the difference.

—Alberto Río
(https://poets.org/poet/alberto-rios)

If you wish to attend the read around (t’s free, fun, a great way to share, and reading a poem is optional). Note: If you registered already, you do not need to register again, simply use the link sent to you in your confirmation email. Register Here:

The next Read-Around is 6/25/26 at 5:00 PM PDT
In-person only in Sacramento, Ca (TBD)

My Thoughts

As opposites, give and take should have equal real estate on the spectrum and the Bell Curve of the population should show those with a relative mix generally in the middle versus the outliers on the edges, including those perceived as mostly givers or takers. Perhaps there is some law of the universe that requires a balance over the population as a whole or over the individual in a lifetime. If so, that may be good news, given the celebration of greed in our world and the drive to join the circus of wealth. I am not immune to the seduction of status and the accumulation of things, but I lacked the ambition to build a golden castle on the cliff edge. Up until recently, I thought of myself as somewhat stingy — protective of my time, careful with my things, living out the Ben Franklin Credo, never a lender nor borrower or be.

But I've been turning the tables recently and have taken a deep interest in generosity. So I searched Google for poems about generosity. Appearing top of the list was Alberto Rios’, When Giving Is All We Have. Maybe the statistics have it wrong, parsing people into one camp or another. Maybe the reality is far more nuanced and subtle. After all, there is a give and take in every breath, in every contact between us and the world, in every interaction. In a strange way, giving may be all we have control over in the equation. We can turn it into a transaction, keep a book of who owes what to whom, mete out reward and punishment accordingly. Or we can abide in a deeper faith, open the faucet for life to flow through us, be the the gracious recipient of what we are given by giving all we have.

Prompt Ideas

1. Journal or write a poem about generoisty, whatever that may mean to you.

2. Journal or write a poem listing reasons for giving. You can use Rios’s repeating phrase: I (or we) give because…

3. Journal or write a poem about a particular time you were inspired to give. What inspired you” What did you do? How did it turn out?

4. Use Rios’ third stanza as your prompt: How has giving made you better? How has giving wounded you?

5. Describe the face of giving, or, as Rios proclaims, the many faces of giving

6. Write about how you or people in general might whisper away their real lives.

7. What stories do you tell or people in your family or circle tell the you don’t want to inhabit; that you want to stop telling or need to retell in a new way.

8. What is a new story you. want to hear (maybe with a dog that trots aongside or a river in a desert that answers your prayers)

9. As usual, write about whatever else inspires you form the poem or from life.