Cirrus@Austlit

'I START WRITING a poem when Ellen is still alive, and it is the first thing I write that I am proud of. It starts with a title (it is part of a sequence) or maybe a number, and then: I was afraid of Easter / stuffed with walnuts and dates / moulded then sugared / (why mould if you’re sugaring?). I forget the next part of the verse, which concludes: moulding and sugaring and Eastering Arabic cakes. Even approaching ninety and losing her sight, Ellen, my grandmother, would make hundreds of the cakes I am writing about, called ma’amoul (and I have subsequently learnt we really did Easter those cakes, cakes also made for Muslim festivals such as Eid and Jewish festivals such as Purim).' (Introduction)