Hand to hand
Passed on. He never keeps it long.
Illustration: the elder’s sleeve reaches down through a tear in the paper, holding out a piece of bnisht.
Where it grows
It starts on the mountain.
Before dawn, the elder and his granddaughter climb to the wild pistachio trees. Every piece of bnisht begins up here.
The tree and its fruit in Kurdish:دارەبەنdarebenقەزوانqezwan
Illustration: at dawn, an elder in a check head-wrap walks up a mountain path with a walking stick, holding his granddaughter’s hand. Wild pistachio trees dot the slopes; a pale sun rises.
MorningNoonEvening
Drag the sun across the day
The harvest
Resin, drop by drop.
All through a summer day the resin gathers on the bark. By evening there is enough to carry home.
Evening. Time to carry it home.
Illustration: the elder works at the trunk of a wild pistachio tree where amber drops of resin gather; his granddaughter waits on a rock with a small bowl.
Into the pot
Amber in, white out.
The maker boils the resin in water and stirs. Slowly the amber turns milky white, and its bitterness fades.
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Milky white. Now it can rest.
Then it rests, and is shaped into small pieces.
Illustration: the woman maker stirs a big black pot over a stone fire with a long wooden paddle; steam rises from the cooking resin.
The bazaar
Everyone takes one.
On market days the heap on the counter never lasts long.
One for the road.
Illustration: a market stall under a brick arch, with a striped awning, a sign reading “Kurdish bnisht”, hanging paper bags, a heap of pieces and the young, smiling seller; people walk past.
Rest
And at the end of the day, one more piece.
Under the same tree, the elder shares a piece with his granddaughter. Somewhere else, someone is taking their first bite.
Illustration: at dusk the elder and his granddaughter sit under the same tree, chewing; he passes her a piece as the pale sun sets and the first stars appear.