I wrote this piece for the 'Peace Through Art Contest' hosted by ALPHA Education -Queen's Chapter, an organization that works to promote the understanding of WWII in Asia.
I also wrote it for an itch I have had for a long time now. An itch that felt of injustice and a strange acceptance of a horrible act.
I have never agreed with the atomic bombings of Nagasaki. That may mean little coming from someone living in the 21st century, outside the time of WWII, but it has always been a feeling I have harboured, and a feeling I have never expressed.
This piece is my attempt at doing just that.
I have done my best to be informed about facts of the time, Japanese terms, and slang used in WWII. I have done my best to paint a picture of what it would be like to be a Japanese family during WWII. I have also done my best to express a loss I have never felt on a scale I will never know.
All of that being said, I hope you enjoy my piece.
Link to Alpha Education: https://www.alphaeducation.org
Link to Alpha Education - Queen's Chapter: Link
Artwork: Evening Bell at Mii-dera Temple,c. 1834-1835, by Utagawa Hiroshige
August 9, 1945
"Utano!" Katashi called to me in-between thumps of burlap bags on the bamboo cart. He was wearing his old military coat. "I'm heading to the city as soon as the rice is loaded. Where is Nozomi?"
Before my voice parted the rice paddies to the cart-road, my daughter was fastened to my breast, nuzzled into my chest. "I don't want to go to training. Please, mom, don’t make me." It was Nozomi's sweet voice, muffled into my shirt.
"Nozomi, don't be silly. It’s just training,” I said with as much sureness in my voice as I could muster. She was seventeen this past month, just old enough to be called for gunji gimu, compulsory military service, in Nagasaki under Japan's new National Resistance Program. "Besides, you are working hard for your country. There is much pride in that, little bird!"
She looked up at me. She was never easy to convince. "But I'm so tired. The air raids kept us up so late last night, I doubt anyone will go anyways. Please, please let me stay!"
"Nozomi, we are a hardier people than that. They will be expecting you at the munition factory and training today," I said, but it did nothing to dislodge Nozomi from my waist.
She looked up at me with her sharp black eyes. They were welted red with hints of tears. "But mom, what about Hiroshima? What if-"
"We do not live in Hiroshima!" I said, sharper than I intended. Nozomi’s grip tightened and relaxed in surprise. "There are much bigger cities in Japan than ours Nozomi," I said, stroking Nozomi’s cropped black hair, clutching the cloth belt at my waist with my free hand, resining my fears to myself as every mother had learned to do.
"But what if? What if they do come here, mom? There have been bombings in Nagasaki before."
"Never before like that, and never again. The westerners have proved their power. There is surely no need for another bomb like…" We have heard only whispers of the destruction at Hiroshima. “That.” Something called an atom bomb was dropped three days ago. The ‘Chīsana Otokonoko’ the westerner’s called it, or ‘Little Boy’ in their language. That they call it something so childish, that they would name it after the many sons they would kill. The little boys whose lives were-
"I cannot be late again Nozomi! We are not the only rice farmers in Nagasaki, even with the war. If the Uzakami's get there before us again I will..." Katashi’s voice trailed from the hitch of the rice wagon. The sight of him in the place our ox made me laugh. I could almost feel his one good eye roll from the cart-path, big and brown as an ox's too, swimming with embarrassment at having to carry the cart himself. We had to sell the ox a few weeks ago. We got good money for it but, looking back, I would have rather gone hungry than have to put up with the constant complaining from my husband.
Nozomi's body shook lightly against mine. It is good for her to laugh, even if it is at her father. I laughed a little harder before I looked down. Nozomi's head was buried deeper into my chest, dampening my rough shirt with her tears. Delicate, as she was in everything she did.
"Nozo, my girl, remember your name," I whispered to her. "Nozomi, for hope. We would not have named you something you were not." She looked up at me with a frown, her chin still resting on my chest, my right-hand now wound in her delicate black hair. How could she be called to the defence of our home? Something sweet as rice pudding and delicate as an orchid. "Without hope, this war would never end. It is only with hope that we can continue to fight. It is only with hope that we can win," I said with every ounce of belief still left in me. What can we really do against such power? How will sending this girl to training make any difference? Sending my little bird to war.
Nozomi’s face turned to a smile. "You're right. You always are mom." Her smile broadened. "Anyways, it will be good to see my friends!" She pulled away and turned toward the house, breaking into a jog. I clenched my cloth belt until I the knuckles in my tendons press against my skin. "Let me get my stuff dad and I'll be ready to go."
"Make it quick Nozomi! I want to be there before lunch," Katashi called from the front of the cart.
"Eyes forward ox-brain or no dinner for you! She will take her time."
Katashi rounded in his place at the head of the cart. "I'll go when I'm- I'll- Don't you call me-"
"I love you too darling," I said cutting off his ramblings as I spread a handful of fertilizer on the wet ground with a smile large enough for his ox-eye to see. He was stubborn as an ox but as gentle as one too. I always loved him for that.
"I want to see my friends too," A small voice said from behind me. I turned to find Junko standing amongst the young rice crop, only two feet taller than the green tips, her small hands balled up into fists that rested on her waist. There is too much of me in her.
"Where is your fertilizer Junko? Surely you aren't done yet."
"It's not fair! Why does Nozomi get to go to the city? I haven't seen Rieko or Tame or any of my friends, not since my school was-"
"Do not mention that Junko!" I said, too sharply again. Her fists dropped. I must not be so harsh; she is just a child. This war is not her burden. I frowned and eased my tone mindfully. "It is a bad omen to talk about such things, especially when your father and sister are going into the city. You know better than that Junko."
"Dad! Can I please come? I promise I'll help. I promise!" Junko shouted past me, ignoring all of what I said. I have never met someone so young remind me so much of myself. I could not help myself from smiling.
"Ahh Junko, what did your mother say?" Katashi called back as he hefted another burlap sack onto the already full cart.
"She will stay with me Katashi. We will take a walk to the Nakamura's once her work is done," I said.
"Make sure to bring our extra rations to them. Mrs. Nakamura is in over her head with her husband away in the air corps. Besides, she has more children to feed than we do," Katashi called back.
"I will Katashi. She will appreciate it greatly. I will send your regards," I said, my gaze now turning down to the little girl whose chubby face was wrinkled sour like an under ripened plum. It was my turn to put my hands on my hips. "That sounds more than fair to me, wouldn't you agree Junko?" Wordlessly, and with a deniable glare not worth pointing out, she turned around and plucked her bag of fertilizer from the ground amidst the reeds of rice and began spreading it as if it were a detestable thing.
"I'll see you soon mom!" Nozomi called, her voice like a cool wind breaking the humid heat of the early morning. I turned and winced. She stood there amongst the green shoots, taller than I ever thought she would be. Her hair of black silk was covered with a soft cap that held the star of Japan, the bōtare draping the back of her white, swan-like neck that was further shortened by a high collar, her graceful legs hidden by ill-fitting trousers. Is it too late to tell her she can stay home? I swallowed the thought, choking it in my throat. It is hard to imagine a helmet on her pretty head, let alone a rifle in her hands. I shook my head. It is her responsibility. She will be ok, she will.
"Mom? I'm leaving now," Nozomi said again, a hint of urgency in her voice.
"Ah, yes. Well, you look like a real..." The word caught, but I pulled it through painfully. "A real soldier. You will do well Nozo. Goodbye, my little bird." She smiled, deaf to my concern.
"Thanks, mom! I'll be home for dinner. Bye Junko!" Nozomi said, jogging to the cart. She saluted Katashi and he saluted back. They both laughed. I gripped my waist so tightly fabric of my shirt almost split into threads. Katashi turned to hoist the cart up, his kunshō, the medals and ribbons he was awarded at the beginning of the war, glinting in the morning sun. Ever since Nozomi was recruited to train for homeland defence he had begun wearing them alongside his military coat. He was an eiseihei, a combat medic, sent home from duty with a shrapnel wound to his right eye, now sealed over like a craggy stone on his face. The multicoloured stripes of honorific cloth danced underneath his collarbone. I hated them all, all but his wound badge, that piece of golden red metal that kept him home and safe. That kept him with us.
"We will be back before late. Goodbye my love," Katashi called as he hefted the cart up. The two of them talked closely as the cart wheels rambled along the rocky pathway. To any other eye, they looked like two soldiers walking side by side. I knew they were father and daughter. I knew.
The sun was shrouded by thin clouds that kept some of the heat off of my back. I spread fertilizer with such focus as I maintained whenever Nozomi and Katashi left to the city. Nozomi was right, of course. She was often right. There had been frequent bombings across all cities and large towns, explosions of fire, often at night, that set whole cities ablaze. Nagasaki is not the largest city. Not by far. There is still Tokyo and Osaka. Kagoshima is just down the coast, and Fukuoka is just north. Surely, they would-
I slapped myself. "Foolish!" I said through clenched teeth, sending the thought deep into the watery soil to bury itself into the earth. To wish such harm upon your people? We are all children of Japan. I felt a hot welt grow on my face, the pulsing fingers of pain rising like mountains across my cheek. Just... Don't let it be Nagasaki. Not today. I lifted my face from the ground and looked around for Junko as a haze of tiredness caught up to me. Nozomi was right again. The air raids had kept us up for the better part of last night. The children had learned to fall asleep to them, distant as they were from our home, but a parent could never sleep with such a sound.
"Junko!" I called across the field. A small black-bobbed haircut rose from the green sprouts. "There you are! Will you get my sun hat? We can leave for Rieko's now if you would like. You have been-" I said, but before I could finish the black bob of hair tilted in a run toward the house, splashing water around her thin ankles. "Careful with the rice Junko!" But it was to little avail. She ran into the house before I could call her to wipe her feet dry. She is headstrong, I will give her that.
I took my time walking toward the house, throwing fertilizer into the watery soil in a row of stalks I hadn't yet reached. I do hope Nozomi and Katashi made it into the city alright. I wouldn't- I stopped. Working in the field gives me time to think; often too much time. I let myself be carried away by the simple work; to distract myself from my worries. I stared into the plants, carefully and precisely lodging the grains of fertilizer into the heart of the rice stalks. They are fine, as they were yesterday, and the day before, and the...
As I neared the edge of the field, Junko appeared at the door in her civilian clothes with straw sun hat my hat in her hands, still muddy from work.
"Junko! I told you always to wash before you put on new clothes. Soap is expensive, cleaning yourself with cold water is not."
Junko huffed and put my hat on her head, taking on a voice as close to my own. "I told you Junko, always wash your hands, and make sure to get in-between your toes or your shoes will smell!" I meant to frown, but my face betrayed me.
"Give me my hat you little fox!" I jumped onto her and tickled her stomach. She laughed, that high pitched joyous laugh that only comes from someone so young. My smile widened. One could not stay mad at Junko for long. "How do you like that! Now, will you clean yourself? Will you?"
"Yes-yes! I will..." Junko kept speaking, but her small voice was framed by a distant hum. I stopped tickling her and rose to my knees. "Does this mean I don't have to wash?"
"Junko, get up. Get inside, quickly."
"But mom, there aren't any sirens! We can still go to-"
"Now!" My voice eclipsed the hum and Junko's eyes widened to saucers. "Inside Junko! Listen to your mother!" Junko ran. I stayed on the wooden slatted walkway for a moment. I looked up, observing. Why aren't the sirens going off? The sky was clearing, only small strips of clouds blocked the sun in the otherwise blue sky. It was a beautiful morning.
Then I spotted them, cresting a large streak of clouds. Two black dots in the sky with a rough form; not nearly enough to make up a bombing party. They do not look Japanese. Everyone in the surrounding lands had been taught, at least second hand, about the shape and colouring of western planes compared to those of the homeland. It was quite a simple distinction really. Most Japanese planes carried the Hinomaru, the circle of the sun on the underside of their wings. These did not. They must be cargo planes if the city has not bothered to raise the alarm. Besides, they don't bomb during the day. I bit my lip. They don't bomb during the day, Utano. They just don't.
I went inside to try to find Junko, my teeth gritting against one another like knives on whetstones. That girl needs to listen more carefully. This is war, not playtime! In the corner of the kitchen, my large straw hat was propped up, shaking gently, accompanied by soft sobbing. The grinding of my teeth silenced, and I frowned. I cannot be so rough with her. "Junko, my girl, it is safe to come out. It was just a cargo plane," I said, coaxing her with a tender voice as I lowered to my knees.
"I don't want to," Junko said, peeking over the hat like a baby fox from its hole. She is strong, but still a child. Always remember that Utano.
"We can still go to Rieko's. Don't you want to see your friend?" I pulled my hat from the corner and it came away easily, revealing the small girl behind. Junko was still, clenching her knees to her chest, streams of clogged tears framing her small lips.
"I'm scared, mom. I don't want to get hurt. I don't want any of us to get hurt," Junko said into her knees.
This is not her war. Remember that Utano, you old fool. She is only a child. "Neither do I Junko, and we won't. The war is almost over, though it may not seem like it," I found that I could lie to myself easier if it meant my daughter's happiness. "Soon we will not have to eat only rice and beef. When was the last time you had oysters?" Junko looked up; her face tight like she had sucked on a lemon.
"Oysters? You know I hate oysters!" Junko laughed. "I want dumplings. Can we have dumplings soon?" She said, lifting her head cautiously.
"Pork dumplings and miso soup and red bean jelly. Everything Junko. Everything you can imagine and more!" The words were as much for me as they were for Junko. "It will be like before the war."
"I don't remember much before the war," Junko said plainly. I clenched my teeth and blinked back a tear. Junko wrapped her short arms around my neck. I squeezed her tightly. "But I do remember the taste of dumplings," she said. I pulled her back so she could see my broad smile. Her chubby face held one that matched mine.
"Now, I should get ready. I'm going to see Mrs. Nakamura. If you want to-"
"I’m coming, I’m coming!" She said, bounding up excitedly.
"I will grab the rations and we will be on our way."
The hum in the sky was gone. The air was filled with Junko's laughter and small feet plodding on the soft ground, searching for frogs in the reeds. Junko looked up at me from the cart-path with a smile. I have not failed her yet. As long as she has room to smile. "Come on Junko! You can look for frogs with Reiko at the Nakamura's," I said without breaking my stride.
I walked to the edge of the cart-path, tracing Katashi and Nozomi's footprints in the soggy soil, being careful not to stamp on them. I worry so much, but they are safe. Junko and I would turn right on the road to reach Mrs. Nakamura's, but we could see all of Nagasaki from the hilltop perch we lived on. "Look Junko, see the black smoke?" I pointed to a plume of smoke that rose from a factory in the faraway city. The two westerner cargo planes mingled with the plume of smog, high above Nagasaki. I pushed them out of my mind. No sirens mean no threat. "That is where Nozomi is, and just to the right is where your father is trading our rice for rations and coin. Do you see why we work so hard?" I looked over at Junko. She was knee-deep in a muddy crop of bushes, sifting through the foliage. "Junko! What did I say about dirtying your clothes!"
Junko's mouth opened to speak, but words didn't come. A light like the sun painted Junko's pale skin bleach white. She turned her eyes and her small mouth widened. I looked to the city, to Nagasaki as what looked like the sun rested atop it. I blinked and, for a moment, I could still see it all from behind my eyelids. My jaw opened.
"Junko..." The word slid from my mouth like water from a jug. I could not look at her, I could not peel my eyes from the white city. "Jun-" then the words were forced deep into my mouth, forced back to thoughts. My ears shook and rang like a gong was pounded inside my head. I stumbled back to brace myself from the noise, then a blast of heat took me from my feet and planted me into the mud as if a ghost of fire walked underneath my skin. I barely felt the earth beneath me, like I was still falling. I didn't feel much of anything, but my body burned. My eyes burned. It hurt to look, even to the orange sky where the white strips of clouds curled around the distant city.
I struggled for breath on the ground, wrestling against the strange force that planted me into the loamy soil. My first breath was for Junko, to call out to her, but it manifested into something less than a whisper. Nozomi. Katashi. They are- It took every shred of myself to pull my head up. The sky was dimmer now, but red and orange, not like a sunset but like the heart of a flame. Above Nagasaki, where the plume of black smoke rose from the munition factory, a thick column of smoke, wider than a building, fed into a growing ball of fire that loomed above the waste. Black smoke, blacker than tar, licked the orange sky, higher than the clouds which shied away from the great burning beast. At the centre of it all, impossible to pry my eyes from, was a ball of fire. It roiled and pumped as if alive, growling with a heat that burned until things no longer felt. Until I could not feel the ground beneath my hands.
I blinked. There was darkness, true darkness behind my eyelids now.
"Mom..." A weak voice groaned from behind me. I turned my head so fast my mind twisted into dizziness. Junko lay on the soft mud just past the hard-packed road, twisting on the ground, writhing like a worm after rain. "Mom I-I can't feel..."
"Shh, Junko. Just… Just rest… Just-" Air raid sirens blared and far away voices broadcasted emergency protocols over radios. I heard them, but they might as well have been the warbling of sparrows or the rustling of the wind in the tall trees. My mind was on Junko, then Nagasaki, then-
A bird fell to the road in front of me; a dull pounding, hardly noticed, limp and still like a rock dropped from the sky. I scrambled to the thing. It breathed heavily, its small heart pounding through its chest. I touched it and, like snuffing a flame, it was still. My little bird. I blinked. Nozomi. I rose to my knees, struggling awkwardly against the muddy ground.
"Nozomi! Katashi!" I shouted to the distant city, if it could be called that any longer. I looked at the grain depot. It was still standing, but the facade, closest to the shallow crater of singed earth, was reduced to nothing. Katashi. Katashi you can't be- You can't be gone. I pulled my eyes away only to face where the munition factory once stood. There was nothing; not a trace of aluminum roof glinting in the sun or high standing concrete wall. Instead, it was all splayed far and wide, as if it had never been. Where the plume of black smoke once was, a building nearby crumpled like a paper lantern catching fire. There was no factory. There was nothing left to be destroyed. There was no-
"NOZOMI!" I shouted into the empty air, filling the orange sky with her name. My mouth could not make any other word, my mind could not form another thought.
Minutes passed like days. Everything was silent now. I helped Junko up, cradling her over my shoulder. I could feel her small head wriggling around to see the city. I didn't have the energy to stop her, I barely had enough to keep my jaw shut. We just looked; it was all we could do. We stood and watched for what felt like hours. We watched the burning beast disappear into the air. We watched the sky turn blue again and the clouds reform. The sun still shone.
As everything righted itself the city remained, like the grey ash of a burnt log. It was still, unruffled by the stale air that refused to roil into wind. The factory was reduced to rubble, the people were- No. No. She cannot be. They cannot be. They- I looked down. By my feet, just beside where my shoe sank into the soft earth, there were matching boot prints. It was a pair of soldiers' boots. It was Nozomi and Katashi's boots. Tears had been silently sapped from my eyes without the mind to sob, only the dull refusal of loss through a veil of possibility made sheer as reality revealed itself, bare and unashamed, bright and striking. To another eye, these were the boot-tracks of a soldier, but they were the feet of a father and a daughter. My husband. My daughter. Katashi and Nozomi.
My little bird.
Comments