Frozen Jews
This poem was done by a man who wrote it during the holocaust in 1944 July the 10th. His name is Avrom Sutzkever.
Have you seen, in fields of snow, frozen Jews, row on row? Blue marble forms lying, not breathing, not dying. Somewhere a flicker of a frozen soul - glint of fish in an icy swell. All brood. Speech and silence are one. Night snow encases the sun. A smile glows immobile from a rose lip's chill. Baby and mother, side by side. Odd that her nipple's dried. Fist, fixed in ice, of a naked old man: the power's undone in his hand. I've sampled death in all guises. Nothing surprises. Yet a frost in July in this heat - a crazy assault in the street. I and blue carrion, face to face. Frozen Jews in a snowy space. Marble shrouds my skin. Words ebb. Light grows thin. I'm frozen, I'm rooted in place like the naked old man enfeebled by ice. |
Biography about Avrom Sutzkever:
Avrom Sutzkever was born in 1913 in the country that is now called Belarus. He was a Yiddish poet who when he wrote his poems they were always about his life. He lived Siberia most of his life and in his poems usually talked about the ghetto he lived in, in Vilna during World War 2. His works also describe his escape to join the Jewish partisans. In 1915 Sutzkever ran away from then country with his family to Eastern Europe and within that Siberia. They returned to their home in 1920 where he later in life studied literature criticism at the University of Vilna. In 1927 he started to write poems and associated himself with group known as the Yung Vilne (Young Vilna). He died in 2010 on January the 20th. What is the poem talking about? This poem is talking about how Jewish people were treated and regarded during the Holocaust. The poem is talking about how when Jewish people were murdered by the Nazi's and the Nazi's couldn't be bothered to pick the bodies up so they left them in the snow. In this poem it gives a very deep description of all the types of people who were murdered; from mothers with children to old men. But all are frozen in the snow. At the end of the poem it is talking about how the poet is so shocked that he is frozen in his place. What are the poetic techniques are used? There are a range of poetic techniques used in this poem they are: Metaphors, visual imagery and rhyme. A metaphor is a technique used in this poem, an example of a metaphor is "Blue marble forms lying, not breathing, not dying". This metaphor is talking about how the Jewish people were left out in the snow to die because the Nazi's kicked them out of their houses. "not breathing, not dying" implies a very slow death. The effect of this is we realise how cruel the Nazi's were and we may get angry towards the people who did the cruelty or feel sad for the people who had to suffer it. There is also visual imagery used in the poem. An example of this is "Odd that her nipple's dried". In this sentence they are saying that a women has been kicked out of her home in the snow with her child. The mother was trying to breastfeed the child but unfortunately the weather was so cold that she couldn't produce any milk because her nipple had frozen. This is a very powerful image since a baby is the symbol of new life and the fact that it will not live because it does not get the nutrients from breastmilk, makes the audience feel the suffering of that time. In this sentence there is also a strong mood of death caused by the imagery. There is a also rhyme shown in the poem an example of this is "Baby and mother, side by side. Odd that her nipple's dried'. This sentence is talking about how a mother and her baby have been kicked out of their home by the Nazi's, in the freezing cold. The mother cannot feed the baby because the snow is so cold her breastmilk has frozen up. This is a very powerful image conveyed to the audience because the rhyme makes it sound jovial and upbeat when ironically it is talking about death. This creates a very eerie atmosphere to the readers because of the irony used in this sentence. |