Candy Bowl

A poetic examination of the deeper meaning of a family's candy bowl.

Image as imagined by Substack AI

Faithfully you filled the candy bowl

Making sure that the children would have something sweet when they came to visit.

The thing is

It was never about the candy.

It was always about the love.

With its crystalline beauty and top heavy clank, the candy bowl was proof of our

existence and our success.

Amidst laughter and crying babies bounced on hips and rocked across laps

We savoured the familiar brightness of peppermint as it landed on our tongues and told us that we were safe within your four walls.

We with soft hands would never understand the sacredness of the candy bowl.

How at 16

You boarded a train headed North

Away from cotton fields, outhouses, and vanilla ice cream

Away from people who knew your people and lovingly called you honey, baby, and chile.

You found work at a paper factory, supplementing your income over the years by making and selling dinners on the side.

Saved enough money and sent for your parents so that they too could start a new life.

After some years passed, you buried your parents and much later, your son.

All the while, you never stopped filling the candy bowl.

It sat on the small table in the living room reflecting light from the lace curtained window

I watched you murmur prayers over the peppermints as you dropped them in one by one.

And this is how I learned that I too could overcome hard things.

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