What’s so good as getting?
The anticipation, snow
in the air, people with lists,
voices that drop when you
enter the room, the pine-wood
fire smell, the smell of pine
needles on the trimmed tree
by the window — it all narrows down
to the heft of the package in the
hands, the guessing, the unwrapping
(carefully: the paper too pretty
to tear), the oh! the oh! What’s so good as getting
if not giving?
The covert questions, the catalogs
with corners turned back, the love
that overlooks cost, the card whose
colored words can’t say it all,
the glee of linking want/wish with
have/hold, the handing over,
fingers brushing, the thing
disclosed, the spark as the eyes
meet, and the hug. What’s
as good as giving?

Luci Shaw © 1987

Luci Shaw is a well-known Christian poet and editor living in West Chicago, Illinois.