17 pages • 34-minute read
When Giving is All We Have
A modern alternative to SparkNotes and CliffsNotes, SuperSummary offers high-quality Study Guides with detailed chapter summaries and analysis of major themes, characters, and more.
Themes
The Universality of Generosity
“We give,” the speaker declares in Line 3, “because giving has changed us.” Although Wisdom Literature can seem sentimental or clichéd in ways that the poem acknowledges when it describes its message as “old, the plot worn and the pages too” (Line 11), Rios refuses to curb his idealism. We continue to read the story of giving—a cornerstone theme of all cultures and civilizations—“over and again” (Line 12) because we realize that when we give to each other in real life, we “have been better for it” (Line 5).
The poem does not offer specificity or elaborate on the kinds of selfless service that encompass compassionate outreach. To inventory actual acts of giving would narrow the reach of the poem. Instead, the poem argues that the scale of the gestures of service to others is irrelevant and that what matters more is the universality of the desire to give: It’s something innate to the natural world as exemplified by the rivers of the epigraph, and it comes from people both in response to and despite the lack of being the recipient of generosity. The smallest gestures, the speaker observes, are “big” (Line 8)—grand in impact and emotional depth. They are also reciprocal, “Mine to yours, yours to mine” (Line 12): Kindness generates kindness, in a cycle that has the potential to make us all “better.”
The Power of Community
“Together,” the speaker concludes, “we made / Something greater from the difference” (Lines 16-17). The effort involved in meaningfully giving to others can seem pointless or overwhelming. However, the poem argues that even those exposed to a world ruthless in its imperative to get ahead have it in them to join the giving cycle. Giving happens even when “nobody gave to us” (Line 2) or when “We have been wounded by it” (Line 6) because the need for the kind of connection forged through mutual aid is innate. We long for community even after the possibilities of that community’s influence on us has passed: After the time when “giving could have changed us” (Line 4) is over, we still give.
Generosity bridges what separates us and defies boundaries. Many of the poem’s images underscore this kind of beneficial merging. The rivers of the epigraph pour their power into each other. The personified figure of giving “has many faces” (Line 7), suggesting a plethora of ethnicity and racial heritage. Even when we are seemingly mismatched—“You gave me blue and I gave you yellow” (Line 13)—we must use this difference to blend into a new exciting whole, becoming “simple green” (Line 14). Growing up in a border town and witnessing the impact of division, Rios has hope that we are capable of forging a more interconnected community, reaching out to the reader by extending his hand, “Mine to yours; yours to mine” (Line 12) to make his conception of a community of caring immediate and real.
The Paradox of Giving
“I gave you,” the poet acknowledges, “[w]hat I had to give” (Lines 25-26). But this declaration of selfless sharing also points to a seeming inconsistency: The poem’s vision of giving is one of plenty, but whatever a person gives away they logically no longer have. The poem refuses to concede this logic. Instead, it makes giving into a somewhat magically additive action, arguing that the more someone gives, the more that person receives. Giving to others makes the giver a “changed” and “better” person (Lines 3, 5), thus adding to their moral and psychological store. It also in turn inspires others.
The dynamic of giving is more complex than the give and take of charity. In the poem, giving is so meaningful that it generates its own kind of abundance. Not only are people capable of sharing their resources, but in giving they can access resources they do not actually possess: “You gave me / What you did not have” (Lines 14-15). This paradox underscores the idea that the product of generosity is greater than the sum of its parts. It is an optimistic vision: a world where we give freely and abundantly, where we are transformed by putting others first, where the human community builds a better world together.
Unlock every key theme and why it matters
Get in-depth breakdowns of the book’s main ideas and how they connect and evolve.
- Explore how themes develop throughout the text
- Connect themes to characters, events, and symbols
- Support essays and discussions with thematic evidence