The Creative Bomb

The Fat Man mushroom cloud resulting from the nuclear explosion over Nagasaki rises 18 km (11 mi, 60,000 ft) into the air from the hypocenter. This week marks the anniversary of the atomic bombings that took place at Hiroshima and Nagasaki on August 6 and August 9 in 1945. In remembrance of these events, here is a poem I wrote called “The Creative Bomb.”

“THE CREATIVE BOMB” – by Ray Fowler

The two-faced god of Janus peered
Intently to the right
And on his left perceived a boy
Who craved creative flight.

With powers of flux unknown to man,
And often blamed as chance,
He touched the lad’s still waiting brain
And watched the neurons dance.

Thoughts ravaged his right hemisphere,
Then, quiet as a theft,
Stole fast across the cortex
To be stored within the left.

Opposing forces caught in time
Wreaked havoc on his brain.
Janusian thoughts negated rhyme;
The contrapuntal reigned.

Destruction, death and severed souls
He could not vindicate.
Aha! Why could he not invent
A bomb that would create?

In chemistry and medicine
We have our antidotes;
The harmful drug may save a life
When taken in small dose.

So why not have a bomb that could
Explode a song of joy,
Shatter new frontiers of thought,
Create, and not destroy?

If dropped on Nagasaki such
A bomb would surely find
That space-time point of harmony
Before the dreadful grind.

No mushroom cloud of measured rage,
Instead our bomb revised
Would bloom a rose of beauty far
Above the watchful skies.

“But stop!” they say. “Review, and let
Your noble neurons rest.
You’ve failed to yield a product –
Creation’s acid test.

The bomb you praise does not exist;
You ponder it in vain.
Perhaps you are the product of
An overactive brain!”

“I have no bomb to give to you
And know not where to start.
And so with failure weighing deep
And heavy on my heart,

I humbly submit to you
(Correct me, if I’m wrong)
This simple poem, now become
One big, creative bomb.”

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Click here for more poems by Ray Fowler.

3 Comments

  1. Tim says:

    The definition of a bomb is: “a container filled with an explosive, incendiary, or other chemical for dropping or hurling, or for detonating by a timing mechanism.” What would the definition for a creative bomb be?

  2. Ray Fowler says:

    Aaah, that is precisely the right question. The answer is in the poem. You’ll just have to read it again! 🙂

  3. Bing Chang says:

    The “Container” is the Bible, The “Explosive” is His Words, and the incendiary is the Holy Spirit.

    My Contemporary Paraphrase of “Psalm 51”
    By Bing Chang

    Have light on us, O Holy Spirit,
    according to your unfailing touch;
    according to your great compassion
    blot out our self-justifications.
    2 Wash away all our vanities
    and cleanse us from our arrogance.
    3 For we know we have closed our hearts,
    and our clogged minds are always before us.
    4 Against you, you only, have we gone astray
    and done what is immoral in your sight;
    so you are right in your verdict
    and justified when you judge.
    5 Surely we had free-will to choose wrong-doing at birth,
    capable of making wrong choices from the time our mothers conceived us.
    6 Yet you desired faithfulness even in the womb;
    you taught us wisdom in that secret place.
    7 Cleanse us with Your Holy touch, and we will be clean;
    wash us, and we will be whiter than snow.
    8 Let us hear joy and gladness;
    let the bones you have crushed rejoice.
    9 Hide our faces from our conceits
    and blot out all our pride and self-righteousness.
    10 Create in us a pure heart, O God,
    and renew a steadfast spirit within us.
    11 Do not cast us from your presence
    or take your Holy Spirit from us.
    12 Restore to us the joy of your salvation
    and grant us a willing spirit, to sustain us.
    13 Then we will share your ways to others,
    so that non-believers will turn back to you.
    14 Deliver us from our impoverished spirits, O God,
    you who are God our Savior,
    and our tongues will sing of your righteousness.
    15 Open our lips, Lord,
    and our mouths will declare your praise.
    16 You do not delight in hypocritical act, or we would show it;
    you do not take pleasure in heartless offerings.
    17 Our sacrifice, O God, is[b] a humble spirit;
    an unpretentious and obedient heart
    you, God, will not despise.
    18 May it please you to prosper all nations and mankind,
    to build up the walls of Your Kingdom on earth.
    19 Then you will delight in our worships as your sons,
    in communion as a whole with You, our God, rejoicing;
    then souls of eternal life are forever consecrated in your blessing.

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