James Kirkup has died, aged 91.In 2004 he sent us a copy of No More Hiroshimas. He had originally collected together this volume of hia A-bomb poems in 1983, but it took twenty years before we published it 'as a real book'. James recounts 'My A-Bomb Biography' in his preface.
Here are the opening lines of the title poem, No Mor
e Hiroshimas.At the station exit, my bundle in hand,
Early the winter afternoon's wet snow
Early the winter afternoon's wet snow
Falls thinly round me, out of a crudded sun.
I had forgotten to remember where I was.
Looking about, I see it might be anywhere -
A station, a town like any other in Japan,
Ramshackle, muddy, noisy, drab; a cheerfully
Shallow impermanence: peeling concrete, litter, 'Atomic
Lotion, for hair fall-out', a flimsy department store;
Racks and towers of neon, flashy over tiled and tilted waves
Of little roofs, shacks cascading lemons and persimmons,
Oranges and dark-red apples, shanties awash with rainbows
Of squid and octopus, shellfish, slabs of tuna, oysters, ice,
Ablaze with fans of solied nude-picture books
Thumbed abstractedly by schoolboys, with second-hand
looks.
There will shortly be a memorial event for James Kirkup in his home town of North Shields.
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