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Nuclear Family Affair

I recently read this book: Full Body Burden: Growing Up in the Nuclear Shadow of Rocky Flats. 

 I couldn't stop reading, even when I was horrified and frustrated by the government coverups, the nuclear disasters, and the persistent denial that plutonium dust in the wind around the general Denver area was a problem.

Still processing, I wrote this long haiku:

Fukushima still
Leaks. Nearly three years later,
Oceans and air fill

With poisons. Unknown:
their full power, permanence,
possibility.

West Coast counters ping.
Measuring high, off the charts.
Radiation moves.

Do we still recall
Chernobyl and Rocky Flats?
Who will be a voice

For Three-Mile Island
Or Lucenz? Did we forget
Not so long ago

Destruction promised?
Mutually assured, we
Worked fevered, counting

Our efforts as so
Much patriotism. Safety
Was secondary.

Radiation lives
Up to its name, spreading out
In water and air.

In animals and
Dusting our salad leaves, we
Take every meal with

Delectable sides
Of plutonium, along
With other spices.

Mutual, assured
Destruction has become real.
Nuclear waste kills

Us before we can
Eliminate each other.
Still we don’t, won't quit.

Don’t act. Stay silent,
Confused. Would our government
Lie? Cover up? Say

Something is quite safe
When it is killing us, our
Children, theirs, and theirs?

What cost: energy?
Bomb stockpile must equal X.
When is it enough

Proliferation?
For any country? Person?
When does will it end?

This is my Father's
World. And my children's. Neighbors'
And my enemies'.

Will I pray with my
Feet, hands, voice, dollars, Spirit.
Even if it feels

Futile? Otherwise
Poison hisses over both
Apples and tuna.

Cleaning and clearing
Deserve our every effort
Since mutually

Assured blessings are
Certainly preferable
For all creation.

Fukushima still
Leaks. Nearly three years later,
Oceans and air fill

With poisons. Unknown:
their full power, permanence,
possibility.



Cross-posted at RevGalBlogPals for The Pastoral is Political.  
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