Cirrus@Austlit

'Earlier this year I received the news that an old friend of mine had passed away. He’d gone at New Years—unable to bear, I guess, the symbolic turn into yet another year, yet another cycle. I spent two months not feeling this, keeping it tight under my skin; not realising how the grief was itching at me. Then, in mid-March, the sore broke open. Crying on the side of the road while waiting for take-away braised eggplant and pickled fish soup, I told my husband about Glyn and the persistent pain of not having been there, not having done something.' (Claire Albrecht : Editorial introduction)