(After an eyewitness account by Dr Tatsuichiro Akizuki) At 10.30 the siren sounded, at 11 o’clock the all-clear. Sticking a needle into a patient, I heard a drone as the plane, lost in the cloud, dropped her baby. It fell silently one and a half miles from its target. It fell for 40 seconds, and in that 40 seconds, every move that people made became a choice between life and death. Strike. The buildings turned red. Electricity poles bloomed like matches, trees like torches. Three kinds of colour, black, yellow and scarlet, loomed over the people, who scattered like ants. An ocean of fire A sky of smoke. Then the people started coming up the hill. Naked, ash-
Doubled by her child your child spoiled shop soiled sex machined for soul- less soldiers invaded knocked up battered. Your child hangs between girl and mother you force anger down cradle her and hers You hear but can’t listen . Bones of bruised face the same eyes yet not look inwards hooded Not knowing her future not wanting that past Strung between there and here somewhere she remains. Finola Scott's poems and short stories have won and been placed in national competitions and are widely published in anthologies and magazines including The Ofi Press, Hark, The Lake, Dactyl & Raum. She was mentored on the Clydebuilt Scheme. A performanc
