Communion

Communion

Walnut hulls stain a man's fingertips, nail beds and palms.
Still, every Christmas,
my father garnered enough nuts
to fill an empty margarine tub.
He'd top it with a red stick-on bow
and tuck it under the tree.
When this gift tradition began is lost to busy ordinariness.
And, the last year was not heralded as sacred.
Those walnuts didn't go into a deep brown fudge
Nor top a butterscotch sundae.
No.
They sat in the back of my refrigerator
until that February night he was buried
when my emptiness ached for the flavor of a black walnut.
Then I picked them one by one from the plastic tub,
chewed and swallowed nut by single nut until not one was left.

Then the ciborium was washed clean,
placed in the cabinet beside his grandmother's tea kettle.