At the concentration camp we stood looking into the oven incinerators. “This is where they raked out the ashes”, said our guide. “You are now standing on the remains of the dead”, he told us. A hush descended only broken by the hum of a Bee as it gleaned its harvest from the meadow flowers around our feet.
DACHAU
Damned were they who incurred it,
There on the Bavarian plain;
Condemning all those they put in it,
To starvation, suffering and pain.
Under scrutiny from the watch towers,
The huts were arranged row by row;
Where many spent their last hours,
Guards scanning the ground below.
Self sufficient their arrogant boast,
Lying that work makes you free;
Extermination the plan of the host,
Immune to feeling or plea.
The Jew and all races here suffered,
Teutonic opponents as well;
Kindness the exception when offered,
In that obscene orderly hell.
Crematoria served out its function,
The gallows a few feet away;
As part of this death line production,
Under the Swastika’s sway.
Long gone those destined to toil,
Until their death did relieve;
Their ashes spread through the soil,
Where people now come to grieve.
I heard the buzz of a Bee on a flower,
Nurtured in ash of the past;
As I reflected on that wicked power,
To the net of suffering cast.
Stillness reigns where evil has been,
The ‘Minora’ carved on a stone;
The poplars grow with crowns of green,
Beside where huts were sown.
The Jourhaus with its gate still stand,
Like a mouth for humanity;
Blind are the towers, no longer manned,
For any then trying to flee.
Only reverence now for those who bled,
On the whim of the beast;
The Bee exploring blooms o’er the dead,
At its pollinating feast.
23.3.07
I personally thought this was a wonderfully written and composed poem. Good job keep it up!!
Obscene orderly hell, reflects this vision perfectly.
I have also visited Dachau and the stillness is so vivid.
You capture this abomination, so very well.