diff --git a/plugin/cancel/README.md b/plugin/cancel/README.md
index 1615f6409..9f7c470d9 100644
--- a/plugin/cancel/README.md
+++ b/plugin/cancel/README.md
@@ -2,14 +2,14 @@
 
 ## Name
 
-*cancel* - a plugin that cancels a request's context after 5001 milliseconds.
+*cancel* - cancels a request's context after 5001 milliseconds.
 
 ## Description
 
 The *cancel* plugin creates a canceling context for each request. It adds a timeout that gets
 triggered after 5001 milliseconds.
 
-The 5001 number is chosen because the default timeout for DNS clients is 5 seconds, after that they
+The 5001 number was chosen because the default timeout for DNS clients is 5 seconds, after that they
 give up.
 
 A plugin interested in the cancellation status should call `plugin.Done()` on the context. If the