Kurihara Sadako is one of the poetic giants of the nuclear age. Born in Hiroshima, she was there on the day the United States dropped an atomic bomb on the city. Since then, she has focused her poetry primarily on the issue of nuclear destruction. She has become the poetic conscience of the Hiroshima that is no more.

When We Say 'Hiroshima' contains a selection of the poems Kurihara wrote between 1942 and 1989. They include meditations on death, on survival, on nuclear radiation, on Japanese politics, on American foreign policy, and on women's issues.