2006 - Vol. 3, Issue 2

For the third night in a row sleep eludes me, and for the first time in my life I almost succumb to my murderous impulses. The cacophony of grunts and moans coming from the senior unit of the Pavilion, coupled with the fusillade of translucent silver bullets plummeting from the stormy night sky nearly brings me to the edge of complete hysteria.

I am not insane. It's just very hard to get any shut–eye when it sounds as if your roommate is dying in a bed only six feet away.

Paul Kahn, nonfiction editor for Breath & Shadow, describes himself as a man with multiple identities; besides being a person with a disability he also is a son, a husband, an American Jew, a Caucasian male, and a writer. When you spend some time talking to Paul, you realize he's all that and more.

Married for almost 17 years, Paul and his wife Ruth live in Newton, Massachusetts, an attractive suburb of Boston. They share their domicile with their shorthaired, black cat Cairo who Paul says "lets us live with him" and whose grace gives him "endless delight."

I understand that
If you're dying of cancer
Life comes into focus.
And all the small stuff
Is revealed as truly small.
Only what will remain
For the next hundred years
Matters.