In a Baghdad Market
March 6, 2007
By Max Sutton

After the blast, “pieces
of flesh and the remains
of books were scattered
everywhere,” a witness said.
Slightly cut by shattered
glass, he saw papers
floating “like leaflets
dropped from a plane”
and “bloodstained pages
that escaped the fire”
falling among
the other remains.

These pages were not metaphors,
though books and lives
have more in common
than an end. Both
can be burnt
or badly stained.