HIROSHIMA

Darker, darker, ever-darkening dawn,
Buildings lying broken, fallen, burnt, forlorn,
Cries echo through passages deep
Lost and echoing to the morning that never came.
Love was there no more, nor sorrow
Piercing through any home's door.
All of misery and evil and even death
Were departing for many nights more.
They came, with the dawn, they came
With the first light, sheer burning light,
Brilliant light, more brilliant, more burning
More awesome and more evil
Than light ever had been before.
Light that Man made.
They came with the first echo, clear booming echo,
Tumultuous echo, more tumultuous, more terrible,
More awesome and more evil
Than echo ever had been before
Echo that Man made.
They came
With the first blood, flowing blood
From wounds more dreadful, more destroying,
More awesome and more evil,
Than wounds ever had been before,
Wounds that Man made.
Sounds in the city of many ordinary lives,
Threading their way across an ordinary day.
And then there was light
And the city was no more.
Dust rose from the ashes
Dust came from the sky
Dust filled the echoing air.
And there was twilight where there had been morning,
Darkness where there had been day.
And the spirit of the night was to reign
For many days.
So with all else, they finally killed the dawn
For why leave that, when you may destroy it?
There leave instead the whirling spheres without light-
In eternal night.
So they finally killed the dawn.

JULIA HETHERINGTON (1970 age 15)