Easter

Another Easter spent feasting on Jelly Bean Martinis, sculpting butter lambs with Nana’s mastiff Escort snoring by tabletop fire. Aunt Bea smoked lemongrass, shading wooden eggs with Dappled Willow shrubs. A whimsical Slovakian cousin suggested we whip each other with willow rods, sprinkle ice-choked water on the women, then blacked out on the buffalo grass after sneaking three Peeptinis, two Blushing Scots, a pitcher of Nana’s Tea Party Two-Punch. Aunt Harley arrived in a felt foxglove bonnet laced with tender golden ribbons, not for a moment distracting from those swollen, swindled lips. Papa Bear worked the washy den in a plush paisley bowtie decoding poached pagan relics every fairy tale tradition from Pancake Tuesdays to Passion Plays, straw doll Judas bonfires to pitching pottery off olive wood balconettes. Cousin Kaylee supplied the wildwood rabbit salad, hot-cross buns spangled with sunny raisins, blossom bread drawn into dandelions. Uncle Rio dispensed the Roasted Cacao bunnies and flattened pennies from a Gator World pit stop, raving on about the Timberwolves, the Raptors, the Jazz. The triplets tore into jute-twined baskets stuffed with chiffon peony barrettes, Minnie Mouse compacts and combs, microscopic, backstitched Bibles beforehand highlighted, honed.