in my garden. I know I’m lucky to have it. When the blossom bursts – Ezra’s white faces – I get up close to inhale its perfume. The scent is too heady on first opening but if fades with the days. I stop to inhale it on my march between the house and shed, sanding and painting, hammering and fixing. Driving to the tarmac field of the supermarket this morning I was thinking of it, flashing under the streetlamps, this aroma to drive the bees crazy and freeze hacks in their tracks, nostrils twitching. It came through as a gentle memory under the feedback shriek of my daily discord – fretting over the coolant level, the broken window switch, the intermittent engine warning light – DI cassette my best guess – the panic news drone from the radio, the shell-smashed bank account, frayed duds, all the wrong turns and wasted hours. The scent of the cherry and the prospect of the afternoon spent tapping at the keys and getting lost in the sentences were a balm to all.