“ The Third World War ” Vision of a Contemporary Thai Poet

บทคัดย่อ

The present paper is based on the comprehensive “Postscript” in Thai, which the author wrote for the volume of collected poems, History Without Killings: Lighthearted Verses on the Theme of the Frog and the Coconut Shell, by Saksiri Meesomsueb (2022). It is intented to forge a coherent system of thought out of the volume containing the poet’s multifarious reactions to, and musings on, contemporary problems, whose seriousness is deliberately clad in what may be called “an aesthetics of frivolity”. Steeped in Buddhist thinking, the poet demonstrates that social ills as well as devastating atrocities occurring in the world of today are not conditioned by external factors but by impurities and defilements from within human beings, known as Kilesa. Although he never conceals his antimilitarism and remains mindful of past and present aberrations, his History Without Killings strives to look forward to an ideal society, in which we should all be engaged in fighting “A Third World War” against our own base instincts. To propel our quest for that goal, the poet draws on a plethora of knowledge and wisdom – Thai, Eastern and Western – which he embodies in verses of exuberant virtuosity and reflective, critical and thought-provoking challenges. The result is an entertaining reading that at the same time enables the reader to overturn his/her “coconut shell” is order to achieve self-discovery.