Not one of us can live twice

On August 6, 1945, at 8.15am, an atom bomb was dropped on the city of Hiroshima, in Japan.

Today, in memory of those who were lost and for those who lived with the aftermath, as well as all of those caught in war, I would like to post an etegami the features a line from a Japanese poet, Toki Zenmaru, writing in 1940 of war reports in China, long before the United States was involved, evoking the pain and tragedy of war.

The full poem in English is:

(source: Oriori no Uta: Poems for all seasons,edited by Ooka Makoto, translated by Janine Beichman; Kodansha 2002)