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Thursday, August 29, 2013

THE OTHER PART

by Rick Gray


A heavy explosion rocked capital Kabul on Tuesday evening. Interior ministry spokesman, Sediq Sediqi said the suicide bomber was looking to enter the ministry of energy and water of Afghanistan, but was recognized by Afghan police before he manage to enter the ministry compound. Source: Khaama Press (KP) | Afghan Online Newspaper


A man blew himself up last night a block away 
outside the Ministry of Water and Energy.


But the part that shook me deepest
happened before dawn today, when my neighbors


switched on their lights, as always,
and on the flames of their stove boiled water for tea

before going to pray.


Rick Gray has poems forthcoming in Salamander and Rkvry. His essay Total Darkness will appear in the forthcoming book Neither Here Nor There: An Anthology of Reverse Culture Shock. He teaches at the American University of Afghanistan in Kabul. When not in Kabul, he lives with his wife and twin daughters in Florida.