I've dropped the bleu cheese dip Now its just carrots, their sweet crunch of emptiness, the crackle they make when I bite into them. I always feel something's not right, that something is missing but then, in an hour, my belly reminds me when it takes the shape of a rounded Biafran from sometime in the seventies, the same ugly distention. They had nothing to eat - poor starving babies - and I can eat nothing without it affecting me. Well, it's not the same thing, of course - I know this is only the first circle of suffering. + He was small, but the hair was all large, wavy dark curls - clearly an arab. The daughter dressed like all of her peers in denim jeans and and a tee with its cutaway sleeves, her small pony tail tied up behind her, but the mother was still a faithful observer: a scarf tightly wrapped, showing only her face and its slight, timid gestures. Their eyes, deepest brown, filled up the room as their voices, all whispers and soft tones, tried to hide what they saw. Even the boy, no more than four. + One has to be precise when cleaning a bathroom. First take everything from the counter and, with a wipe, remove all the dust. Spray on a cleaner, something bound to be toxic to germs and dust mites, any leftover viruses. While it's doing its work, move to the toilet bowl, squeeze out the product designed to eradicate all the rank fungus that's been gowing so long. Then windex the mirror, and make sure you squeek off the blue alcohol mist one paper towel at a time. Don't forget: wear a mask, and rubber gloves are a must to protect yourself from the filth. + I read this essay about difficult poems, how to read them without too much frustration, too much self-doubt. It wasn't clear to me whether he was being satirical but, nonetheless, I took it to heart. And how could I not, for it's well known that those are all that I write. + The world outside is never as pretty as after a rainstorm, clouds still in the sky, but now starting to dissipate, with sunlight in rays frosting the trees. The grass is as green as the green that's in Ireland and the flower blooms, wet, glisten their charms. Too soon it's all spoiled when the lawnmowers come. + I've tried to imagine bombs blasting away buildings, the smell of burnt flesh and hot asphalt, smoke and particulates - but I can't. My explosions have always been fireworks, my bullets, aimed at inanimate targets. My violence has always been personal - a man with a fist, or sharp pointed boots kicking my head and the ribs in my chest. All of my terrorists have shown themselves first. + People will ask: What's the connection? What's the point of all this? And most times they don't speak so direct, but I hear each pause and each silence. I'm ashamed I can't tell them. Ashamed I can't speak about what it is that I know: Here, in these fingers, healed but mishappen. Here, in gray hairs on my wrists and my arms. Here, in these scars that circle my navel, and ring round my right ear. They still want an old dog's laboured breathing, a purposeful panting, somehow signaling Spring.