Calamity and Desire | Akira Wakita, Dean of the Faculty of Environment and Information Studies
2020.03.31
Calamity and Desire
Unstoppable desire
Consuming lavishly,
Filling the atmosphere with filth,
Raising the temperature,
Melting the glaciers,
Driving plagues northward,
Endangering our own lives.
Still, we cannot contain this gushing desire.
Absorbed in playing with fire,
Causing accidents,
Scattering radiation,
Creating uninhabitable lands,
Damaging our own genes.
And still, desire overflows.
Reaching into sacred forests,
Unleashing hidden beings into the world,
Paralyzing society,
Jeopardizing jobs,
And endangering our own lives as well.
And yet, desire remains unstoppable.
Humans gain a sense of being alive by provoking themselves.
All desire is connected to this.
While confronting the novel coronavirus,
this is what I have been thinking about.