How to eat a croissant

Someone once gave me a gift,
and before he gave it to me, said,

"This is a gift.
Which means that it is yours completely.
And you are completely free
to do with it as you wish."

And then he gave me a turkey feather.

(He was inspired to give me a turkey feather
by some members of a Native American community
whom he had met long ago in his life and career.)

I said thank you and
accepted the turkey feather
from this man
whom I had loved and respected
And that evening I gave the

turkey feather to my
four-year-old daughter,
who squealed to receive
something so big,
so natural
and so joyfully a part of this earth.

She destroyed it in the creative play of unfettered childhood.

I think about gifts sometimes,
about the guilts we lay over them
when we fail to let go of the gift
even as it passes out of our hands,
into the hands of whom we love,
how our generosity fails to launch,
how we come short of giving
and fall back on taking.

I think about gifts
when I think about the French,
and how it troubles you to let go of your gifts,
those you concocted,
those you perfected,
those you plundered, strangled, stole,
and now clutch tight,
griping at us who would receive them.