By Ron Faust
Once again we return
To this site
Of immense
Destruction if
The trigger parts
Made here
Join a system
Of creating
A nuclear weapon
We already know
The horrors of Hiroshima
Killing 141,000
On that fateful day
Plus 74,000 more
In Nagasaki
Three days later
Lest we forget
Each one of us is like an ant
Having the misfortune
Of falling into a basin
Scrambling around the edge
Of the rising water
Finally gripping the side
To plan an escape
When a big drip
Forms above its path
To cause its demise
A multitude of ants come
From their construction site
To the rescue
Too late to save one ant
But they move on
Like us, builders
Of a peaceful
Community
Peacemakers would have reasons
To feel defeated
If we thought
We were insignificant
Like an ant
But a vision of peace
Keeps us going
We cross the line
To raise the stakes
In avoiding
Total annihilation
And seeing how close
We can come
To the edge of the abyss
Building instruments of destruction
Leads to prophecy
Of spiritual death
Which is not worth all
The money in the world
We can learn from ants
How they can come back
So too, equality with them
Is a measure of justice
More important
We can learn to live.
5/20/23 (On occasion in making our protest of drawing attention
to the madness of building nuclear weapons at the KC National Security Campus
of the NNSA, the National Nuclear Security Administration)
