It was a study of Abu Nuwas, an Arabic poet (c. 756–814) famous for his poems on alcohol, love, homosexuality, and other sins. In bed, with a new notebook, I started to copy the lines of poetry that drew me in. They were pebbles on the road; the true hidden diamonds were the words and phrases whose true power was hidden. I convince myself that I forget what I memorize, but ghosts of writers and people I stole from keep chasing me. Still, in most of my books, I have a list of writers that I stole from, to thank them.