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After Hiroshima
That day, stealth crept over
Fifty thousand beings
Or more, a cloud invaded all Hiroshima.
The wretched shrieks, and shouts
Faded with the billowing
Hypnotic fume. No mercy did the heavens show!
The black bomb that mushroomed
Into a giant cloud
Undoing death, undoing pain stood Gingko’s green.
Wars can erase cities,
Humanity, and peace.
Can warfare, nature's bounty, undo? Alas think!
Basket-like, four-legged
Thousand leaflets bloom
The older ones, golden,
Tinted dusky red at the edges
Extend like protective palms
Over the tiny plantlets yet to bloom
A million lives thrive in a
Ten-by-ten inch terracotta-bowl
Whoever says nothing gold can stay
Knows not the Midas touch
Of the leathern miracle leaf
That is the mother of a million.
Nor do they know the tenacious gingko tree
That wept over millions
Shedding all its golden leaves
That fluttered after another Eden sunk
When Hiroshima was bombed.
Fifty thousand beings
Or more, a cloud invaded all Hiroshima.
The wretched shrieks, and shouts
Faded with the billowing
Hypnotic fume. No mercy did the heavens show!
The black bomb that mushroomed
Into a giant cloud
Undoing death, undoing pain stood Gingko’s green.
Wars can erase cities,
Humanity, and peace.
Can warfare, nature's bounty, undo? Alas think!
Goethe's Plant and Gingko
In a cracked terracotta-potBasket-like, four-legged
Thousand leaflets bloom
The older ones, golden,
Tinted dusky red at the edges
Extend like protective palms
Over the tiny plantlets yet to bloom
A million lives thrive in a
Ten-by-ten inch terracotta-bowl
Whoever says nothing gold can stay
Knows not the Midas touch
Of the leathern miracle leaf
That is the mother of a million.
Nor do they know the tenacious gingko tree
That wept over millions
Shedding all its golden leaves
That fluttered after another Eden sunk
When Hiroshima was bombed.
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Batool Idrish Siamwala pens in her maiden name, Mumtaz Khorakiwala. She has come back to her first love - writing poetry, after teaching English Language and Literature at the St. Joseph's College for Women Vizag, for nearly a decade. Her work has received accolades on several platforms, and a Special Mention WE Awards 2022. Her poetry was awarded a fourth place in the 2024 NaPoWriMo, by KalaLaya, a digital platform. Her poetic journey comprises her being a part of several anthologies; and publishing her volume of poetry titled Saudade in 2024.
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