Three

And then it was candied orange peel and chocolate
almond macaroons and key lime pie and vanilla-bean
marshmallows and toffee dripped & drizzled with
bittersweet. And just on the first day!

Sugar-dipped ginger cookies and Russian tea cakes
and red-and-white candy-cane cookies and just
possibly divinity, if the air dries a bit. Not fudge:
I can't stomach its cloying sugary excess.

There is an ancient cookie press in the trunk
of my car which I may employ in the spritz department.
Love the interchangeable patterns, the spiraling
handle, the aluminum housing. There is even
a wooden rack with a slot for each pattern-plate.
The box is long-disintegrated so I store it in Zip-Loc,
alas. (I don't actually store the press in my car trunk.
It was at the other house, and I picked it up today.)

This could go on for weeks, months even. But it won't.
January carries its own particular abstinence, and
waits just beyond the kitchen door.