{"id":124532,"date":"2018-12-24T12:00:44","date_gmt":"2018-12-24T12:00:44","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.transcend.org\/tms\/?p=124532"},"modified":"2018-12-20T12:00:36","modified_gmt":"2018-12-20T12:00:36","slug":"in-the-shadow-of-the-bomb-poems-of-survival","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.transcend.org\/tms\/2018\/12\/in-the-shadow-of-the-bomb-poems-of-survival\/","title":{"rendered":"In the Shadow of the Bomb: Poems of Survival"},"content":{"rendered":"

\"\"<\/a><\/strong>In the Shadow of the Bomb: Poems of Survival, by David Krieger. A Nuclear Age Peace Foundation Book, 2018, pp. 107<\/em><\/strong><\/p><\/blockquote>\n

This is the third book of poetry by David Krieger I am reviewing. The first, Wake Up<\/em>, was a warning call; the second, Portraits: Peacemakers, Warmongers and People Between<\/em>, etched the personalities of doers and their deeds; and in the latest, In the Shadow of the Bomb,<\/em> Krieger confronts us with the naked reality of The Bomb.<\/strong> The questions he raises are: What is the value of poetry in the face of weapons of mass annihilation? Can poems awaken us to the dangers of the Nuclear Age?<\/p>\n

In fact, with each poetry collection, Krieger has been bringing us closer to the question of nuclear war and our survival. American President Trump, in fact, now pronounces America\u2019s preparedness for an armed Space force. Krieger’s latest collection is about our hubris when a missile loaded with nuclear weapons is pointed at the collective head of humanity. Can we avert our eyes and pretend not to see? In the poem, \u2018In Our Hubris\u2019, Krieger asks: Have we given up on our common future? He wants the reader to react, resist, and awaken before it’s too late. Krieger’s work is unabashedly polemical, a nonkilling manifesto about the future, conscious of the contemporary history of the Western world.<\/p>\n

His poem \u2018When the Bomb Became Our God\u2019 tells us how close we have come to meeting the fate we have been shaping for ourselves:<\/p>\n

\u201cWhen the Bomb became our God<\/em>
\nWe loved it far too much,<\/em>
\nWorshipping no other gods before it.<\/em>
\nWhen the bomb became our god<\/em>
\nWe lived in a constant state of war<\/em>
\nThat we called peace.\u201d<\/em><\/p><\/blockquote>\n

In another poem, \u2018People of the Bomb\u2019, he observes:<\/p>\n

\u201cThe bomb may have ended the war,<\/em>
\nbut only if history is read<\/em>
\nlike a distant star. If only the sky<\/em>
\nhad not turned white and aged.<\/em>
\nIf only time had not bolted to change course,<\/em>
\nIf only the white flags had flown before<\/em>
\nthe strange storm.\u201d<\/em><\/p><\/blockquote>\n

In the section entitled, “What Shall We Call the Bomb Dropped on Hiroshima?” the poet asks:<\/p>\n

“Shall we call it<\/em>
\nThe Beginning of the End or<\/em>
\nThe End of the Beginning?\u201d<\/em><\/p><\/blockquote>\n

Of those two dreadful August mornings when the Atomic Bombs were dropped on Hiroshima and Nagasaki, he recalls the words of General Dwight D. Eisenhower, “It wasn’t necessary to hit them with those awful things.” In that August 1945 history lesson, his insight doesn’t miss the evident racism of that dastardly act. On August 6th and August 9th, the two atomic bombs were dropped on civilians at Hiroshima and Nagasaki respectively. Ironically, between the dropping of those two atomic bombs, the U.S. signed the Charter of the Nuremberg Tribunal, agreeing to hold Nazi leaders accountable for crimes against\u00a0 peace, war crimes, and crimes against humanity.<\/p>\n

\u2018Where did the victims (of nuclear attacks) go?\u2019 The poet demands, and then answers:<\/p>\n

\u201cWhere else would the victims go but first<\/em>
\ninto the air, then into the water, then into the grasses,<\/em>
\nand eventually into our food?<\/em>
\nWhat does this mean?<\/em>
\nIt means that we breathe our victims,<\/em>
\nthat we drink them and eat them, without tasting<\/em>
\nthe bitterness, in our daily meals. <\/em><\/p><\/blockquote>\n

In another poem, entitled, \u2018Among the Ashes\u2019, amidst the charred bodies in Hiroshima, a daughter recognizes the gold tooth of her mother:<\/p>\n

\u201cAs the girl reached out<\/em>
\nto touch the burnt body,<\/em>
\nher mother crumbled to ashes<\/em>
\nHer mother, vivid<\/em>
\nin the girl’s memory, sifted<\/em>
\nthrough her fingers, floated away.\u201d<\/em><\/p><\/blockquote>\n

The poet\u2019s hurt challenges our humanity: \u201cHow dared we do all that?\u201d<\/p>\n

\u201cWe are mighty. We take what we want<\/em>
\nwhen we want, believing there is no accounting.\u201d<\/em><\/p><\/blockquote>\n

In 1948, George Orwell wrote: “If you want a picture of the future, imagine a boot stamping on a human face – forever.” In his poem, \u2018Warning to Americans\u2019, Krieger writes:<\/p>\n

“Don’t look into the mirror, You may be frightened<\/em>
\nby the raw redness of your jingoism. You may find <\/em>
\na flag tattooed on your forehead or on your chest.<\/em><\/p>\n

….<\/em><\/p>\n

Don’t mourn the loss of your freedoms. Remember,<\/em>
\nOrwell warned this would come.<\/em>
\nYour freedoms were not meant to last forever.<\/em><\/p><\/blockquote>\n

David Krieger, a founder and president of the Nuclear Age Peace Foundation, is so familiar with the history of his country, government and people that with poems about warring America, in the section, \u2018Reflections of a Tragic History\u2019, his poetry describes with a sense of irony how atomic weapons obliterated cities for the wrong reasons, carpet bombing and massacre of civilians done in the name of freedom and demonstrating technology might, sacrifice of children and slaughter of\u00a0 peasants for presidential lies. Searching for a silver lining, the poet concludes: “Is there no possibility that our hearts, like sad continents, \/ may reattach themselves to life?” Krieger coaxes his reader to, “Think, and Think Again” about the implications of looking at fellow humans as hajjis, gooks, savages…, <\/em>they are humans not \u2018the other\u2019.<\/em><\/p>\n

In \u2018Rules of Engagement\u2019, the poet points to how wars have continued to dehumanize American soldiers, reminding us of an incident in the Afghan war when three Afghans lay dead on their backs in the dirt, and the four young U.S. Marines in battle gear took to celebrate their victory urinating on them.\u00a0 That act, Krieger notes, was like holding up a mirror proclaiming – “this is who we are.”<\/em><\/p>\n

\u201cWhen we teach our children to kill, we turn them<\/em>
\nInto something we don\u2019t understand: ourselves.<\/em>
\nTheir lack of humanity is not different from ours.<\/em>
\nWe have not taught these young men to value life.<\/em>
\nThey teach us how little we do.<\/em>
\nWhy should they hold back when we have<\/em>
\ntaught them and sent them to kill other men —<\/em>
\nmen whose names they will never know?<\/em>
\nIf we are shocked by their disrespect for the dead,<\/em>
\nwe should consider our own for the living.\u201d<\/em><\/p><\/blockquote>\n

In the section, \u2018Oh War\u2019, Krieger provides a narrative on archeology of war given by politicians, generals, and businessmen starting with distant beating of the drums exhorting the need for sacrifice from \u2018Soldiers Fall\u2019 to the deaths of \u2018Children of War\u2019, to singing of \u2018War Crime Blues\u2019:<\/p>\n

\u201cHave you heard the terrible news?<\/em>
\nU.S. forces bombed a hospital in Kunduz.<\/em>
\nIt gives me a case of the wartime blues,<\/em>
\nmakes me shake with the war crime blues.<\/em>
\nYou can’t win a war, you can only lose.\u201d<\/em><\/p><\/blockquote>\n

In another poem, the poet continues:<\/p>\n

\u201cWar spreads<\/em>
\nits sad red wings.<\/em><\/p>\n

\u00a0<\/em>Soldiers fall<\/em>
\nlike white flowers<\/em>
\non a winter field.<\/em>
\nThey sink <\/em>
\nin burning snow.\u201d <\/em><\/p><\/blockquote>\n

The final part of the collection has about a dozen poems of hope and inspiration, challenging the reader to stand up and be counted — giving us reasons to end war. These are deeply moving poems of positivity. Some snippets:<\/p>\n

Standing with Pablo<\/strong><\/p>\n

(\u201cI have a higher duty to my conscience\u201d. –Pablo Paredes)<\/p>\n

\u201cLike the three tenors, like three pillars,<\/em>
\nthere are three Pablos for peace:<\/em>
\nPicasso, Neruda and Paredes.<\/em><\/p>\n

….<\/em><\/p>\n

The first painted Guernica, the second<\/em>
\nwrote poems as an act of peace.<\/em>
\nThe third refused to fight in Iraq.<\/em><\/p>\n

….<\/em><\/p>\n

Pable Picasso painted the horrors of war.<\/em>
\nPablo Neruda wrote poems of love and decency.<\/em>
\nPablo Peredes refused to kill or be killed.\u201d<\/em><\/p><\/blockquote>\n

I refuse<\/strong><\/p>\n

for Camilo Mejia<\/em><\/p>\n

\u201cI refuse to be used as a tool<\/em>
\nof war, to kill on order,<\/em>
\nto give my life for a lie.<\/em>
\nI refuse to be indoctrinated<\/em>
\nor subordinated, to allow the military<\/em>
\nto define all I can be.\u201d<\/strong><\/em><\/p><\/blockquote>\n

David Krieger believes we have to elevate our moral and spiritual level to take control of our most dangerous technologies and abolish them before they abolish us. A great story teller, his poetry of survival asks us to awaken our passion to end the nuclear era, trying to ignite in us a love for life, encouraging us to pass the world on intact to new generation(s). Celebrating the possibility of a living planet, in his poem, \u2018A Conspiracy of Decency\u2019, his optimism shines:<\/p>\n

\u201cWe will conspire to find new ways to say people matter.<\/em>
\nThis conspiracy will be bold.<\/em>
\nEveryone will dance at wholly inappropriate times.<\/em>
\nThey will burst out singing non-patriotic songs.<\/em>
\nAnd the not-so-secret password will be Peace.\u201d <\/strong><\/em><\/p><\/blockquote>\n

Like the Nobel Poet Laureate Rabindranath Tagore, who wrote in 1913: “The small truth has words that are clear; the great truth has great silence”, Krieger believes that \u201cWithin the awful shattering chaos of war, lives a still and silent seed of peace.\u201d <\/em>The seed of our existence and essence.\u00a0 —\u00a0 A powerful collection of poems.<\/p>\n

***<\/p>\n

[The book is available on Amazon and the NAPF Peace Store (online at www.wagingpeace.org<http:\/\/www.wagingpeace.org<\/a>> ].<\/strong><\/p><\/blockquote>\n

__________________________________________<\/em><\/p>\n

\"\"<\/a><\/em>Bill (Balwant) Bhaneja\u00a0is a former Canadian diplomat and a member of the TRANSCEND Network for Peace Development Environment<\/a>. He produces\u00a0the Nonkilling Arts Research Committee (NKARC)\u00a0Newsletter for the Center for Global Nonkilling.\u00a0A writer and peace activist, his recent books include:\u00a0<\/em>Quest for Gandhi: A Nonkilling Journey (2010)<\/em> and<\/em> Troubled Pilgrimage: Passage to Pakistan (2013). He is a founding member of the Center for Global Nonkilling, Honolulu-Hawai\u2019i (www.nonkilling.org<\/a>)<\/em> and lives in Ottawa, Canada.<\/em><\/p>\n

\"\"<\/a><\/em>David Krieger, Ph.D. is founder and president of the Nuclear Age Peace Foundation, and a member of the TRANSCEND Network for Peace Development Environment<\/a>. Amongst several of his wide-spanning leadership endeavors in global peacebuilding, he is a founder and a member of the Global Council of Abolition 2000, councilor on the World Future Council, and is the chair of the Executive Committee of the International Network of Engineers and Scientists for Global Responsibility. He has a BA in Psychology and holds MA and Ph.D. degrees in Political Science from the University of Hawaii as well as a J.D. from the Santa Barbara College of Law; he served for 20 years as a judge <\/em>pro tem for the Santa Barbara Municipal and Superior Courts. Dr. Krieger is the author of many books and studies of peace in the Nuclear Age. He has written or edited more than 20 books and hundreds of articles and book chapters. He is a recipient of several awards and honors, including the OMNI Center for Peace, Justice and Ecology Peace Writing Award for Poetry (2010)<\/em>. He has a new collection of poems entitled <\/em>Wake Up.\u00a0 For more visit the <\/em>Nuclear Age Peace Foundation website: www.wagingpeace.org<\/a>.<\/em><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

This is the third book of poetry by David Krieger I am reviewing. The first, Wake Up, was a warning call; the second, Portraits: Peacemakers, Warmongers and People Between, etched the personalities of doers and their deeds; and in the latest, In the Shadow of the Bomb, Krieger confronts us with the naked reality of The Bomb. The questions he raises are: What is the value of poetry in the face of weapons of mass annihilation? Can poems awaken us to the dangers of the Nuclear Age?<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":4,"featured_media":124533,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[67],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-124532","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-reviews"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.transcend.org\/tms\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/124532","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.transcend.org\/tms\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.transcend.org\/tms\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.transcend.org\/tms\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/4"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.transcend.org\/tms\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=124532"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.transcend.org\/tms\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/124532\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.transcend.org\/tms\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/124533"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.transcend.org\/tms\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=124532"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.transcend.org\/tms\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=124532"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.transcend.org\/tms\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=124532"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}