Haibun: Hiroshima Day

This is a post I wrote a couple of years ago. It still rings true today. I have shortened it a bit and added a video by World Order, a Japanese singing group. I am posting the version with English lyrics so you call can understand the words. Ironically it ends at the beach on which the Fukushima Power Plant stands. The band received special dispensation to go and briefly film some shots there. It shows alternative power sources, the helping of the injured in the tsunami (symbolic) and how in their homage to Hiroshima and Nagasaki, “time just stops”.

Hiroshima Day
“We are still living in the aftershock of Hiroshima, people are still the scars of history.” – Edward Bond

America dropped the first of two atomic bombs on Hiroshima. People were going about their normal activities that day. Women were shopping for food to prepare for dinner that night. Children were playing and men were going about their business preparing to continue facing off against the Americans. They went about with living not knowing death was in the skies.

Suddenly the sky turned white and within a few seconds Hiroshima was almost obliterated from the face of the earth. The death toll was approximately 90,000 – 120,000 men, women, and children. Some walked after the blast until they collapsed and died. Others died of burns and being crushed by falling buildings. Skeletons could be seen in the debris. Still later, people died from bone marrow disease from the extreme radiation. A few skeletal structures remained standing, notably the white gate Shinto. “Photos” of people etched into stone by the blast- their bodies obliterated but replaced by the radiation remained. We bear a guilt so deep time will never leach it from our bones as the bomb turned people and buildings, plants, and animals into dust.

children jumping rope
on hot August day – becoming
shadows forever