THe Action in the ghetto of rohatyn march 1942
This poem is written by a survivor of the holocaust his name is Alexander Kimel.
Do I want to remember? The peaceful ghetto, before the raid: Children shaking like leaves in the wind. Mothers searching for a piece of bread. Shadows, on swollen legs, moving with fear. No, I don't want to remember, but how can I forget? Do I want to remember, the creation of hell? The shouts of the Raiders, enjoying the hunt. Cries of the wounded, begging for life. Faces of mothers carved with pain. Hiding Children, dripping with fear. No, I don't want to remember, but how can I forget? Do I want to remember, my fearful return? Families vanished in the midst of the day. The mass grave steaming with vapor of blood. Mothers searching for children in vain. The pain of the ghetto, cuts like a knife. No, I don't want to remember, but how can I forget? Do I want to remember, the wailing of the night? The doors kicked ajar, ripped feathers floating the air. The night scented with snow-melting blood. While the compassionate moon, is showing the way. For the faceless shadows, searching for kin. No, I don't want to remember, but I cannot forget. Do I want to remember this world upside down? Where the departed are blessed with an instant death. While the living condemned to a short wretched life, And a long tortuous journey into unnamed place, Converting Living Souls, into ashes and gas. No. I Have to Remember and Never Let You Forget. |
Biography of Alexander Kimel:
He was originally born in Podhajce in Western Ukraine, his date of birth is unknown. His family then moved to Rohatyn in 1939 because the Red Cross had thrown them out of their hometown. He as a result grew up in the ghetto. A ghetto is a place where people who were considered 'unclean' by the Nazi's (for example the Jewish, Homosexuals and Communists) were confined and kept away from German civilians. This community was constantly subjected to fear and threats from the Nazi's as well as being in extremely poor conditions such as no sanitation, little food, poverty and little shelter. 1942, 7200 Jewish people were shot and taken to gas chambers in Alexander's ghetto. In May of 1943 he ran away from the ghetto to a near by forest. One month later the Nazi's declared the area "Judenrein" which meant every Jewish person in that area was dead. After this he immigrated to the United States got a job as an engineer and started a family. What is the poem talking about?:
The poem is talking about the time of the holocaust. Inside the time of the holocaust they had places which were called ghettos . Ghettos were places where people who did not fit the Nazi ideals were taken from there homes and squished into a small space of land. Alexander Kimel is a survivor of the Holocaust, one of the concentration camp. In this poem he is talking about the cruel treatment people were put through in these ghettos. For example he says "Do I want to remember, the wailing of the night?" This implies that in the middle of the night in the ghettos people were taken away from there families and and shot. What Poetic devices does this poem use?: This poem uses a range of poetic devices that I will list: Repetition, rhetorical questions, personification and visual imagery. There is a constant repetition of the phrase "Do I want to remember?" throughout the whole poem. As well as repetition this is also a rhetorical question. The sentence is not asking a question to the audience but rather Kimel is trying to convey the message of I do not like remembering the ghettos because it is painful but I do so that you can understand what it was like. The effect on the audience is they understand how he wishes to forget but cannot. A bit like he is cursed to remember, so we sympathise with him as the audience, and understand his pain through his words as well as thinking over the experience he has been put through. The repetition also puts a emphasises of the amount of pain and suffering he has been through and gives the poem that beat of stumbling feet through the streets, bombs being dropped or the sound of guns. There is also the use of personification. An example of a personification used in this poem is "While the compassionate moon, is showing the way". This personification is talking about how people who are on the streets have only way for them to navigate anywhere. The effect is, because the moon is known as a solitary and lonely object, it implies a helpless atmosphere. This sentence creates the mood the reader interprets as a hopeless atmosphere where there is almost no chance of survival. This poem also uses visual imagery. An example of visual imagery is "The doors kicked ajar, ripped feathers floating the air". This visual imagery is talking about how when the Nazi's invaded the ghetto's they would kick down peoples door's and force them outside. The ripped feathers floating through the air is talking about how they forcefully plundered peoples houses and pulled people from the beds (which have a lot of feathers) and out onto the street. The effect on the audience is it makes them realise the cruel things the Nazi's did and therefore we sympathies with the people subjected to this. |