AFTER BASH
Chalk
white moon, a disc of pooling light.
Round
old pond, stillness unruffled,
Bird
tucked inward. Behind
Embankment
of clouds, a frog leaps—
Touchdown
in water!
Black
sky bursts, broken,
Beatific
placid mirror shattered
By
splash of a big blast,
Droplets,
tremulous,
Subatomic
particles scattering,
Tsunami
unleashing gamma waves, X-rays,
70,000
instantly dead…
Genbaku
Dome, UNESCO World Heritage Site.
Originally
published in Eastlit (August 1, 2015)
 |
| Genbaku Dome, Hiroshima, Japan. UN Photo |
Total deaths estimated that immediately resulted from the Hiroshima bombing varies. The 1946 Manhattan Engineer District Study calculated that 45,000 died the first day, while CNN.com (August 6, 2013) cited the figure of 80,000 “instantly” killed. The poem “After Basho” cites the figure of 70,000, a reasonable estimate based on the range given in some reputable sources, e.g. bbc.co.uk (October 15, 2014), of 60,000 to 80,000 instantly killed.
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UN Photo reproduced under Fair Use terms
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Gonzalinho da Costa
Basho biography: http://www.poetryfoundation.org/bio/basho
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Basho's frog haiku: http://www.bopsecrets.org/gateway/passages/basho-frog.htm
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Also published in Arlijo, Issue 86 (March 1, 2016)
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Also published in Teresa Mei Chuc, ed., Nuclear Impact: Broken Atoms in Our Hands (Pasadena, California: Shabda Press, 2017), p. 377
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