TRINITY / EARTHRISE -- two paths

How complicated the ways we wander
once truth is lost,

How needless the wars,
how unnecessary the waste.

I'd like to ask that we think together of two images,
to really take them to heart. One is the historic and
magnificent Earthrise photograph made by astronaut
Bill Anders, assisted by Buzz Aldrin, on the first
Apollo mission around the dark side of the Moon.
The other is the equally historic photograph made
but a micro-second into the beginning of
Earth's Nuclear Age at the Trinity Test of July the
16th, 1945. This was the first nuclear device ever
tested, and was the same design as the bomb dropped
a few weeks later on Nagasaki, Japan. It was upon
witnessing the immense fireball unleashed by the
bomb, hearing its sound, feeling its intense heat,
that Robert Oppenheimer, the enigmatic scientific
leader of the top-secret Manhattan Project, uttered
the prophetic phrase from the Bhavagad Gita,
"I am become Death, Destroyer of Worlds."

These two images signify for me two paths. One
I call the Trinity Path. It points in the direction
of certain self-destruction. This is the path humanity
is at present following. The other, is the Earthrise
Path of a potential planet of peace.

The Trinity Path is not a question of fate. Neither
is it an expression of some evil force which is
somehow active in the universe. I see it as simply
a wrong turn, a mistake. I believe that a majority
of citizens of Planet Earth have seen this for some
time, now. Yet the path of Earthrise, of a new spirit
of non-violence that rejects the very concept of war
as a means of resolving conflicts of any kind,
remains elusive.

In taking these two images to heart, really trying
to understand their source, the formative forces
behind them, we become aware, I think, of the more
profound and challenging implications of non-violence.
This is non-violence seen not just as a philosophy,
but as a wholly different way of being.

| download mp3 TWO PATHS 11 Mb] |
[the birds heard in background are the SPIRIT THRUSH
(also know as Spirit Thrush (Zoothera naevia) & HERMIT THRUSH
(Catharus guttatus), both recorded here in the Wallowas

ALSO heard at end of recording:
Holy Sonnet XIV, by John Donne (1572-1631)—
the poem Robert Oppenheimer called, TRINITY . . .

[Batter My Heart, Three-Person'd God]

Batter my heart, three person'd God; for, you
As yet but knocke, breathe, shine, and seeke to mend;
That I may rise, and stand, o'erthrow mee,'and bend
Your force, to breake, blow, burn and make me new.
I, like an usurpt towne, to'another due,
Labour to'admit you, but Oh, to no end,
Reason your viceroy in mee, mee should defend,
But is captiv'd, and proves weake or untrue.
Yet dearley'I love you,'and would be loved faine,
But am betroth'd unto your enemie:
Divorce mee,'untie, or breake that knot againe,
Take mee to you, imprison mee, for I
Except you'enthrall mee, never shall be free,
Nor ever chast, except you ravish mee.

HANFORD REACH

ETHICAL IMPERATIVES±
a meditation on Earthrise

Related Photoweek pages . . .

WORLD WITHOUT NUCLEAR

"I am here not so much concerned about what is commonly
regarded as "the nuclear debate," that is, whether or not nuclear
power is necessary to address Climate Change, or whether or not
there is an irrational, exaggerated fear of the health effects of
radiation. This is because I feel that what passes for debate or
argument is really by and large what I call, conclusionary rhetoric.
This is a kind of arguing backwards and disingenuously from rigidly
held conclusions, "

Featured gallery, 100 MINIATURES, a set of 100 black & white photographs. ONE image. ONE idea. ONE new way of looking . . .

100 MINIATURES—online gallery

Each miniature is a kind of meditation on one idea & one image;
Each lasts 30 seconds; They play in random order;
The music is my BOREA Mix,
for hand-played ePecussion Orchestra.
[ mouse over for controls / lower right fro full-screen ]