We went out to Elk Island and walked part of the trail around Moss Lake.

There are buds on everything, full and furled so tight that they’ll have to burst open soon. Catkins everywhere. Dry grass and fallen trees and in the midst of that, a million things on the trembling precipice of bloom.

I made hot chocolate cookies. Cocoa, cayenne, cinnamon, vanilla. There is something Venusian, right for Beltane, in that.