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Who could forget that flash! One instant swept Thirty thousand off the street, Crushing darkness stifled Fifty thousand screams, Then yellow smoke whirling upwards Reveals rent buildings and smashedbridges, Crowded trams standing gutted And interminable rubble andcinders. This was Hiroshima. Then there came, hands on breasts, Shredded skin hanging, Treading in spilt brains, Singed tatters of cloth abouttheir hips, Hordes of wailing naked. Bodies scattered like stone imagesover the parade ground; A tangled mass crawled to mooredtimber rafts And died in heaps under theparching sun. Flames, soaring against theevening sky, Burned alive Mothers and brothers pinned underruins. In the faeces on the arsenal floor Escaped schoolgirls Sprawled, swollen-bellied, Eyes shattered, skinless andhairless. The morning sun shone on theunrecognizable herd. Nothing moved, In the hanging stench But a cloud of flies round themetal basins. Who could forget that totalsilence That reigned over the city ofthree hundred thousand. How could we forget the wishes That our lost wives and children Forced deep into our hearts Through their bleached orbits ofeyes In that silence! (From A-bomb Poetry) |
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