surrounded by family and friends we enter the new year blind. four o’clock, moving rapidly south, smoke-like clouds traveling overseas, engulf the land, the beach abandoned. three hours early or four hours late, another hour early. fireworks and outdoor parties banned, a massacre, an other new year, a blanket, as if called for. “i remember in 1990, maneesha used to say it would be the end of the world soon.” we sleep, prepare for life, the new, and still miss it by two minutes …in blindness, 2009