POETRY ON THE SHOAH







BARBARA KOBOS KAMINSKA


I Do Not Know


To my Mother

I do not know
when to embark on the journey
of your youth.

I do not know
where to seek the traces
of the Holocaust
in the land full of
ashes and blood.

I hear fear.
I hear crying.
I hear screams.

1973




* * *



BARBARA KOBOS KAMINSKA


He Told Me Everything


A man in a dark hat
resembled my grandpa Simon
from an old photograph

I noticed the image of his face
in the pane of the rumbling train.
A tear stopped on his cheek
covered with life's wrinkles.

In his palm he clasped a small pebble.
Suddenly he did recall how
the body heat had been leaving
the freezing hand of his little daughter.

She froze to death in the winter of 1942
in a sealed cattle railcar
on her way to the gas chamber,
together with her sisters.

1973




* * *



BARBARA KOBOS KAMINSKA


In the Permanence of Unforgetfulness


To my Mother

You still see
her shining hair
interlaced in a braid,
her palm searching for
a palm's warmth,
her eyes trustfully looking
from the face of a child's fear,
when violently separated,
forcibly stripped off
her humanity
she stepped lonely
towards the termination
of her life.

1979




* * *



BARBARA KOBOS KAMINSKA


The Well-Known Journey Into The Unknown


A transport of children in cattle railcars,
with but a slice of black bread and a bundle
filled with the baggage of their childhood.

In this uninterrupted journey,
the dawn of the rising day pushed slowly
through the small barred car’s window.

Then the train suddenly stopped thus
causing screams of the panicked children
being torn away from their mother's arms.

The well-known journey into the unknown.
Where to and what for?
Without mother, father, and God.

1969




* * *



BARBARA KOBOS KAMINSKA


The Terminal Station


The transport lasted days and nights
on a train packed with exhausted
women clinging to their meagre bundles.
Nothing but screams and wailings
escaped the chock-full railcars.

The train slowly came to a stop
on the middle track.
It was the terminal station –
Auschwitz-Birkenau.

1974




* * *



BARBARA KOBOS KAMINSKA


Where To ?


The barbed-wired fence
in several rows,
with no end;
watch towers, search lights.
Selection.

Long columns of human figures
in heavy wooden shoes,
grey striped tattered clothing,
slowly move through
the camp's deserted pathways
at this grey dusk.

Only a tormenting voice is heard,
sharp shouts of commands that sound
like the last scream of a human being murdered.
yet differently.

No one knows where to:
To the right, to a barrack?
To the left, to death?
To the shower with water?
To the shower with gas?

Nobody has pointed to God.
And God where to?

1974



Translated from Polish into English by Andrew M. Kobos,   2003.


Barbara Kobos Kaminska is a Polish-Swedish poet and translator.   She lives in Sweden.


Barbara Kobos Kaminska





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