Throughout "Your Cake" the etymology of words is given. To illustrate this point, in stanzas seven and eight, the etymology of the spices "cassia, cinnamon, coriander, ginger, caraway, nutmeg" (46) and "cloves" (46) is given:
             "Hebrew kesiah and kinnamon, Latin coriandrum;
             Clow of gilofer, nail of the clove tree;
             The pungent, small, hard things were flower-buds. " (46-60)
             Brown further goes on to describe the roots of the word "ginger" (46) as "an etymological odyssey longer and stranger than any mere physical journey." (48-49). This is not only a comment about one single word, but also a comment about language as a whole. Brown is highlighting that
             ...