Nic Robertson is CNN's international diplomatic editor. The opinions in this article belong to the author.

Belfast, Northern Ireland (CNN) Hundreds of miles from Brussels, Theresa May is in Belfast, doing her best to put out the fires that her Brexit deal has caused.

Her visit to Northern Ireland comes as smoldering discontent over her deal burns to full flame.

David Trimble, one of the architects of the Good Friday Agreement , is threatening May with a legal challenge.

At the same time, the Democratic Unionist Party, or DUP, which props up May's government, is fuming at what it considers her ineptitude and weak-willed attempts to negotiate with the European Union.

The DUP believes that the EU is the villain of this piece. It also thinks May is too timid for the challenge of Brexit negotiations.

For the party, the backstop insurance policy intended to keep Northern Ireland's borders seamless with the Republic of Ireland -- as is stated in the Good Friday Agreement -- is itself breaking that peace agreement.

As the Brexit deadline looms, reality is setting in. Everything that has been fought for in the past is up for grabs again.

For the unionists, that means maintaining the union with the United Kingdom; for republicans in Northern Ireland that means keeping the frictionless borders that hold open their aspiration of a one-day united Ireland.

Only two weeks ago, hard-line republicans set off a car bomb outside a Northern Irish courthouse . In a flash, the inferno rekindled memories of bygone bloodshed.

No one was injured, but it has been almost a decade since an attack of that scale.

The specter of violence is real, as is the fact that Brexit uncertainty could make more in Northern Ireland sympathetic to the hard-liners' cause.

The Irish government, which along with the UK guaranteed the peace deal, finds itself increasingly vilified.

On the eve of the UK Prime Minister's visit, Ireland's deputy leader, Simon Coveney, took a thinly veiled swipe at May's plans to return to Brussels demanding legally binding "alternative arrangements" to the backstop, saying it was to "take an agreed position and replace it with wishful thinking."

Trimble argues his case in equally nimble diplomatic terms. He is careful to blame both British and Irish governments: "The important thing here is that in the agreement, both the British and Irish governments undertook to support the agreement and what they've done, both of them, is broken that promise."

But it is Ireland upon whom unionists are venting their anger and demanding it change its position. It's a call that is being echoed by May's ministers, who want the EU to soften its position on the backstop.

Brexit is unearthing the angers of past generations that have barely been laid to rest.

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What divides here in Northern Ireland is culture and identity, the two totems of populism.

What unifies is the economy, and a desire to protect what peace meant for Northern Ireland: thriving, integrated cross-border trade, fundamental to prosperity north and south.

The day before May arrived in Belfast, a group of EU commissioners inspected a busy border road, looking at the faint change in tarmac, all that delineates republic from the north.

It is soon to be one of the EU's most northwesterly fringes. The gaggle was calculating Ireland's readiness to handle what is fast becoming its most contentious frontier.

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Into this May arrived with little more than platitudes and no more of a plan to placate her enemies or political partners in the north.

Indeed, her short-notice trip to Belfast speaks volumes of her silence on Brussels.

She creates the impression of a leader filling time or running out the clock. She could be hoping that the looming deadline, March 29, sharpens minds and delivers her a parliamentary consensus, in the absence of Brussels offering her any meaningful "alternative arrangements."

The words "alternative arrangements" have become a hollow albatross flitting around her head. They risk being as empty and meaningless as "Brexit means Brexit." And while May might think running down the clock might help her, it also takes the UK closer to a no deal.

With regard to the Brexit negotiations, May is exactly where she was two months ago, possibly further back, having proven herself obdurate beyond EU comprehension.

On her mission to Belfast, May will try to reassure Northern Ireland's 1.8 million people that she hasn't forgotten about them and will keep fighting for them, no matter their political views.

She laid platitudes on with a trowel, saying, "I know this is a concerning time for many people here in Northern Ireland."

With just seven weeks to go, May promised two as yet mutually exclusive outcomes: a deal "... that commands broad support across the community in Northern Ireland ... " and "... that secures a majority in the Westminster Parliament."

More than two years on, May remains heavy on aspirations, light on solutions.

She barely seems to notice she is no longer in the lead: The arguments, anger and division have marched right past her.

Flames are licking at her feet. If she feels the heat, she isn't showing it.

But everyone else is. And by the day, her solutions whiff less of water and more of kerosene.