Het Groene Hart

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Het Groene Hart
klopt gloeiend rood.
Aorta’s snijden
er doorheen.
Zéng, zéng.
Pukkelende gezwellen
vreten het aan.

Het Groene Hart
bloedt dood
uit aderen van groei.

Fatma and her little boy

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I communicate with Fatma in gestures – signs and touching – and a few words. The other day I took her to the park with her youngest child. Although he is only two we did not take the stroller. Fatma was holding his hand. “Can you let him go?” I asked.
When she did, he took off into the open space. He climbed the fence and fed grass to the ponies. He giggled. We picked daisies and walked among the blooming rhododendrons. The air smelled sweet. The boy’s short legs ran and ran. Then we sat on a bench under the trees until it was time to go home.
On the way back in the bus he fell asleep on his mother’s lap. She tilted her scarfed head like a little bird and smiled coquettishly.
Her headache was gone. So were her palpitations.

Dust if you Must

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Dust if you must, but wouldn't it be better,
To paint a picture or write a letter,
Bake a cake or plant a seed,
Ponder the difference between want and need?

Dust if you must, but there's not much time,
With rivers to swim and mountains to climb,
Music to hear and books to read,
Friends to cherish and life to lead.

Dust if you must, but the world's out there
With the sun in your eyes, the wind in your hair,
A flutter of snow, a shower of rain.
This day will not come around again.

Dust if you must, but bear in mind,
Old age will come and it's not kind.
And when you go and go you must,
You, yourself, will make more dust.

author unknown

Preparing for Summer: Adirondeck Chair

Homeopathy

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Medical doctors who feel threatened by alternative medicine like acupuncture and homeopathy, have tried try to disprove their effectiveness by testing it the way they would test new allopathic medication. Thus they find what they are looking for: alternative medicine does not work (the way traditional medicine works.) That patients get well is irrelevant.
These doctors do not see that in different fields of science different sets of laws are applicable. Their method of testing is like proving eye contact is not a form of communication, because it does not obey the rules of grammar!

Het Pad Terug

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Als je het pad terug
kunt vinden
ligt de weg
eruit
open.

Druilerig

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ze staan te kleumen
bij de tram
druilerig als de stad,
hun jassen nat

geen vat
op voor of tegen,
eens of later

wat mensen in de regen
wachtend met het water
aan hun neus,
hun voeten in
een smerig schoenenbad.

Fatma

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Her name is Fatma. She comes from Morocco. She followed a much older husband to live in an apartment in the inner city of a strange land. Her native tongue is Arabic. She is illiterate.
She only leaves the house to pick up the children from school and to go shopping. She does not travel on the bus or the streetcar, afraid that someone will accost her in Dutch, and she will not know what to say. She went to language classes but fellow students laughed at her stupidity – she thinks. So she hides in her apartment.
Her children speak Dutch, of which she understands very little. She thinks they despise her for not speaking the language of the country. She feels their disrespect – she says.
Her husband is fed up with her fear of the unknown world around her – she thinks.

Caramelized Carrots

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Fry one or two shallots shortly in a wok or similar pan in oil. Add scraped, diced carrots and cook and stir until soft and brown. Add salt and pepper and chopped parsley, if you like.

This way of cooking carrots intensifies their sweetness, and makes the sugar that my mother-in-law used to add totally superfluous!

European Constitution

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What a farce, all that outcry on the European Constitution! What a debâcle! How can my faith in potiticians ever be restored?