If you have an office full of women, this book of poetry by Deborah Garrison is such a fun gift – proof that poetry needn’t be inscrutable to be intelligent. My favorite poem:

The Firemen

God forgive me– It’s the firemen,
leaning in the firehouse garage
with their sleeves rolled up
on the hottest day of the year. As usual, the darkest one is handsomest.
The oldest is handsomest.
The one with the thin, wiry arms is handsomest.
The young one already going bald is handsomest. And so on.
Every day I pass them at their station:
the word sexy wouldn’t do them justice.
Such idle men are divine– especially in the summer, when my hair
sticks to the back of my neck,
a dirty wind from the subway grate
blows my skirt up, and I feel vulgar, lifting my hair, gathering it together,
tying it back while they watch
as a kind of relief.
Once, one of them walked beside me. to the corner. Looked into my eyes.
He said, “Will I never see you again?”
Gutsy, I thought.
I’m afraid not, I thought. What I said was I’m sorry.
But how could he look into my eyes
if I didn’t look equally into his?
I’m sorry: as though he’d come close, as though this really were a near miss.