POETRY ON THE SHOAH








WLADYSLAW SZLENGEL


NIHIL NOVI


I have followed my sorrowful way
for two thousand years
and my track
day by day
have dragged behind me like a shadow –
a litany of infamy and evil
– that I am poisoning the water wells
– that I am bringing bad weather
– that I cast spells on the cattle
– that I steal golden crosses from the temples
– to spit on them and smrear them with mud
– and sell them at high price
– a bloodied tribute am I paying to God
– am mixing the matzah with children's blood
– and for all my festivals
– I always kidnap pale-faced kids
– to pluck their dead eyes out
– and draw their hearty blood...
years after years have passed
the image of the world has changed
culture enlightenment progress
yet for you it has remained so simple:
that I have secrets dungeons
that I am counting gold at nights
the wars are made quickly
when the Elders of Zion wish so

A Big Profiteer – a Big Sorcerer
A revolution – just on my signal!
The calendars keep falling into the abyss
so many events so many ones
bosh and prejudice keep perishing away
the radio has arrived speed cinema
the mankind racks its brains to everything
yet only with me...
nihil novi: (nothing new)

– I am – the bourgeois exploitation
– I am – the world crisis
– I am a Communist and a rich man
– I am a Hassid – I fight with God
– all the evil from the whole world
– in my one heart interlocks
– I continue robbing and strangling
– in order to hide gold in my cellars
– the world would capture the golden fleece
– if only I was removed
– it has always been me – a gunpowder barrel
– ...to stun the mob
and me ?...
I am still alive
How annoying it is, is it not? shameful even
but just to spite them...
it is well-known
a Jew


Nasz Przeglad, ("Our Review") July 18, 1937,
National Library, Jerusalem


Translated from the original in Polish into English by Halina Birenbaum


Wladyslaw Szlengel (1914-1943) was a Jewish Polish poet living in Warsaw.
He was killed in Warsaw Ghetto Uprising in April 1943.



* * *




WLADYSLAW SZLENGEL


A SMALL STATION OF TREBLINKA


Here is the small station of Treblinka
Here is the small station of Treblinka
On the line between Tluszcz and Warszawa
From the railway station Warsaw - East
You get out of the station and travel straight

The journey lasts
five hours and 45 minutes more
And sometimes the same journey lasts
A whole life until your death

And the station is very small
Three firtrees grow there
And a regular signboard saying
Here is the small station of Treblinka...
Here is the small station of Treblinka...

And no cashier even
Gone is the cargo man
And for a million zloty
You will not get a return ticket

And nobody waits for you in the station
And nobody waves a handkerchief towards you
Only silence hung there in the air
To welcome you in the blind wilderness

And silent is the pillar of the station
And silent are the three firtrees
And silent is the black board
Because here is the small station of Treblinka...

Here is the small station of Treblinka...
And only a commercial board stands still:
"Cook only by gas"
Here is the small station of Treblinka...
Here is the small station of Treblinka...


Translated from Polish to Hebrew by Halina Birenbaum
and from Hebrew to English by Ada Holtzman


Yehuda Poliker, son of an Auschwitz Holocaust survivor from Thessaloniki, wrote music to the poem and it is in his album:
"Ashes and Dust".

* * *




WLADYSLAW SZLENGEL


THE SMALL STATION TREBLINKA


On the line Tluszcz-Warszawa
From station Warschau-Ost
Rail tracks leave
And go straight on...

And the trip lasts sometimes
Five hours and three quarters
And sometimes it can last
The whole life till death...

And the station is very small
And three fir trees grow there
And the board is marked simply
Here is the station Treblinka

There is not a wicket
Or a baggage man
Not for a million shall you get
A ticket to return...

No one waits at the station
No one waves a handkerchief
Only the silence hangs on
And greets one with the deaf void.

And the station's pole keeps silent
And the three fir trees keep silent
And the black inscription keeps silent
That... it is the station Treblinka

And only long since hangs
(An advertisement anyway)
A worn out old inscription
"Cook with gas!"


Translated from Polish to English by Halina Birenbaum



* * *




WLADYSLAW SZLENGEL


THE MONUMENT


To heroes – poems, rhapsodies!!!
To heroes the descendants will pay homage,
their names engraved on the plinths
and to them a monument of marble.

To valiant soldiers – medals!
To soldier's death – a cross!
Spell the glory and suffering
Into steel, granite and bronze!

Legends will remain after the Great Ones,
That they were such Enormous,
The myth will coagulate and – shall become
The Monument.

But who will tell you, the Future Generations,
Not about the bronze or the myth theme –
But that they took HER – killed Her
And that SHE is no longer...

Was She good? – Not even so –
She often quarreled after all,
Slammed the door, reprimanded...
But – She was.

Pretty? She was never pretty,
Even before her hair had silvered.
Wise? Well, quite ordinarily, not stupid…
But… She was.

You see: She was, and now when She is not,
Every corner looks on with evil eyes
And at once you can see She is not here.

Even not for such a big word: Home,
My God, was it a true household?!
          (they were not from Warsaw)
The husband was spending whole days in his workshop
The son – also had his own doings somewhere
The little room was often not cleaned
          (for She had to bring water from the downstairs),
Yet in a way all the implements were at hand
The clock kept smiling,
So – She was
She was.

And what? A human being? No – it is unimportant –
no statistics will mention Her,
for the world, for Europe She was less than a grain of dust.
Big deal all her efforts!
But when you only neared the entrance,
before you'd held the door-handle, before you'd pushed the door
something smelled in the air
perhaps a warm soup, or a white towel,
a kind of warmth would have wrapped around you,
so…
        She was.

And they took Her.
She left as She stood.
From near the kitchen stove.
They had no time for the soup...
They took Her, She went – she is no longer,
they have killed her.

Her husband will return from the workshop,
he will sit heavily on the stool,
his hands will drop on his lap,
he turns his head all around and looks.

No fire under the stove range –
the dish-cloth fell on the floor,
a plate on the table – it's all dirty around.
He does not rise. He leans. He thinks.
Too bad.
               She is no longer.

He would eat the bread and soup from the workshop
The workshop food – alien to him and miserable.
He eats and looks:
on the shelf a silent,
cold and dead Her pot.

He will not return to the workshop,
the son will come back hungry from the city,
into the undone bed
he will throw himself with his mud-covered boots on.
He will not fall asleep.
He will look and will not forget...
            Down there there is Mother's   p o t   cooled down –
            HER MONUMENT...


Translated from Polish to English by Halina Birenbaum



* * *




WLADYSLAW SZLENGEL


A CONVERSATION WITH THE CHILD


The year is nineteen forty two.
A mother and a child. A workshop – a block...
The child's face is coloured lilac,
The mother's hair is milk-white,
tell me mother – asks the little one –
what does it mean: far away
Far away it means behind the mountains
behind the forests and the rivers...
Far away it means the rails...
Far away it means the sea voyages,
ships and the bluish space above us,
and mountains in the purple of the sun...
Far away means islands of gold
and a fragrant breeze
it is a rich greenery
and sand – soft dry.
But how to explain it to a child,
what the word far away means
when he does not know what a mountain is,
and he does not know what is called a river...
and he has no, unlike his mother... has no unlike me
pictures stored under his eyelid,
then how to explain it to a child,
what the word: far away means
Far away – my beloved child
(and a tear wobbles in the eyelashes)
Far away means like from our block
up to the Toebbens one... 1)
And tell me, my dear mum
what does it mean: long ago...
Long ago that is an evening in the city
the shining lamps, the neon lights
it is the silent peacefulness of our flat
and a well heated stove…
Long ago – it is the cakes from the Ziemianska 2)
long ago – it is a dinner at the radio
long ago – "Our Review" newspaper in the morning, 3)
and in the evening "Palladium" cinema.
Long ago – it means a month on the seaside,
long ago – means pictures from our excursion
and the wedding pictures showing my veil
and a piece of white bread with no chaff...
But how to explain to a child
the past that was bright and glorious
when nothing... he does know nothing yet...
how to explain to him: LONG AGO...
You see, my beloved darling,
it is the old and the sad in your youth,
long ago – it means, when since long...
they did not give us a honey ration...
And tell me, mum, tell me
what is it that I keep hearing at nights...
a whistle so long and from so afar...
what is whistling so much and why...

How to explain to a child,
what an example or reason to use
to explain him the nightly,
far-away whistles of the locomotives...
how to explain the rails
and the long journey into the boundlessness,
the joy of travelling in a sleeping carriage
and the frenzied expresses.
Railway stations, signals, switches,
cities not known, streets,
tickets, transfers, luggage
a courier, refreshment stalls, a porter.
Twinkling lights at night
and the lilac trail of smoke.
How explain it... and what for,
that somewhere far away still there is a world?...

That world there means – my little boy,
You that have clasped your little hands plaintively,
that it could be much further than Toebbens...
and much earlier than the honey... 4)

Translated from Polish to English by Halina Birenbaum


Notes:

  1. Tobbens was the name of large workshops in the Warsaw Ghetto, where the Jews forcibly worked for the Germans.   (return)

  2. "Ziemianska" was the name of perhaps the best and the most famed coffee-house and confectionery in the pre-war Warsaw.   (return)

  3. "Nasz Przeglad" ("Our Review") was the Jewish daily newspaper published in pre-war Warsaw.   (return)

  4. In the Warsaw Ghetto from time to time rations of artificial honey were given to the Jews.   (return)



    * * *




    WLADYSLAW SZLENGEL


    IT'S ABOUT TIME


    It's about time! About time!
    He has frightened us for so long with the day of reckoning!
    Now we have had enough of prayers and penances.
    Today you shall face our judgment
    And shall await the verdict humbly.
    With a mighty stone we'll throw onto your heart
    The blasphemous, horrendous and blood stained accusation.
    – With the edge of a battleaxe, with the blades of sabres
    It shall burst into the heaven like the Tower of Babel.
    And you, up there, the great convict,
    You up there in the horrific interstellar silence,
    Will be able to hear every word of ours,
    How the chosen people are bringing charges against you
    – No pay back, no pay back!!!
    This that once you, so many years ago,
    Had led us out from Egypt into our land,
    Will change nothing! It will change nothing!
    Now we shall not forgive you any longer
    That you have been turning us in into the hands of thugs –
    That, for the millennia,
    We have been to you like faithful children.
    With your name each of us was dying
    In the arenas of the Caesars, in Nero's circus.
    On the crosses of the Romans, on the stakes of Spain
    We, the beaten and reviled, the manhandled.
    And you turned us in to the Cossacks
    Who ripped your Holy Covenant to shreds.
    For the agony of the Ghetto, for the spectre of gallows
    We the humiliated, we the tormented –
    For the death in Treblinka, we the bent under the whip,
    We will pay back! We will pay you back!
    – Now you will not escape your end!
    When we bring you to the slaying place,
    You will not be able to bribe the bathhouse guard
    With a 100-dollar golden disc of sun.
    And when the hangman will have driven and forced you
    And dragged, pushed you into the steam chamber
    And hermetically closed the hatch behind you,
    The hot steam will begin to suffocate, to suffocate you,
    And you will scream, you will try to escape –
    And after the torture of dying will have ended
    They will drag your body along and throw it into a monstrous pit,
    They will pull your stars out – the gold teeth out of your jaw –
    At the end they will burn you
    And you will become but ashes.


    Warsaw, The Ghetto, December 1942.


    Translated from Polish to English by Halina Birenbaum.
    The translation edited by Andrew Kobos



    * * *




    WLADYSLAW SZLENGEL


    THE ACCOUNT WITH GOD


    (The Warsaw Ghetto, 1943)


    Perhaps it was a dream – (but rather not)
    or maybe my drink had intoxicated me.
    We sat together – God and me
    and were settling the account...

    God was an elderly gentleman,
    his look was full of grace
    he had a long grey beard
    and walked without the armband.     1)

    He did not have a "Kennkarte"     2)

    for He'd arrived directly from Eden,
    yet He had a citizenship,
    reportedly... Uruguay's.

    I pulled out a large book
    while God – His Waterman pen.
    I opened the account – The Faith,
    and said... Sir...

    I am 32 years old,
    the years of satiety or poverty,
    but until now, Oh God,
    I had an open credit.

    I was told: "you pray..."
    – I did pray,
    I was told: "you fast..."
    – I did fast...

    Throughout the hard days of fast,
    with not a drop of water in my mouth,
    just for Your grand glory
    and the fictitious laws.

    In the exhausting streaks of the candle lights,
    in the turmoil of synagogues' rooms
    I prayed so that You could
    Count my deeds...

    I was told: "Thou shalt not steal..."
    – I did not steal,
    I was told: "Do not eat pork..."
    (I like it) – I did not eat.

    I was told: "So wants God..."
    I was told: "It is the way of God..."
    I was told: "Thou shalt not commit adultery..."
    – I did abstain... for God.

    I was told: "Thou shalt not kill..."
    – I did not kill.
    "Thou shalt have no other gods before Me..."
    – I did have none.

    There are various pleasant feasts,
    There are various difficult ones,
    both ten times a year,
    I was commanded to remember them all...

    I was commanded to sit in a sukkah,
    to drink bitterly, eat the matzah,
    to atone many times,
    and neglect my work.

    With the phylactery straps I squeezed my hands,
    I devoured the holy books through all nights
    and mortified my body.
    Pardon me, I'm asking – what for?

    I have said: "God will help,"
    I have said: "God will save,"
    I have believed: "God's been with me,"
    I have said: "And so on..."

    Please have a look into the book
    It is clear and obvious.
    Look! – The page of Your deeds
    towards me – is whole blank...

    They hit me in my face
    – I do not keep escaping
    like a hunted animal from burrow to burrow.
    I'm waiting... yet You do nothing...

    I'm hungry, I'm freezing, I'm longing,
    my way is getting wilder and longer,
    it's become empty and deadly all around me,
    but I’m not crying... I'm waiting...

    Blown into the winds have been:
    the craving, the fast, the lamentation
    and a hundred thousand of prayers
    and half a million of "Amen"...

    What do You give me today
    for all my deeds?
    – This Block... This tin badge,     3) Umschlagplatz,
    The coupons,     4) or Treblinki?

    Do You still expect that I
    the day after tomorrow, like in the Testament,
    when going under Prussian gas
    Shall still say "Amen" to You?

    So, say something, please, speak up,
    take out the account from the hiding.
    The books are open – look! –
    You, Partner of my life...

    And the gentle, elderly man,
    with whom I drank at the table,
    took a pencil in his hand and said...
    and here I got awaken...

    Was it but an ordinary dream? –
    Or was I just overcome with the drink?
    Yet till this day I know not how
    the account has been settled.


    Translated from Polish to English by Halina Birenbaum.
    The translation edited by Andrew Kobos



    Notes:

    1. Armband with the Star of David imposed by the German on all Jews of the Ghetto.   (return)

    2. "Kennkarte": the ID document issued by Germans to non-Jewish adults in occupied Poland.   (return)

    3. Tin badges: Tags with numbers on them, were IDs of those who worked at the Umschlagplatz, i.e. the Jewish police and other "support" workers, who had to wear them on their jackets. These badges came together with the "Ausweis", the permission to stay in the Ghetto and not be deported – the so-called "Lebens Recht", The Right to Live...   (return)

    4. Coupons, or "Bony" in Polish: food ration coupons given to people in the Ghetto.   (return)







    Wladyslaw Szlengel: What I Read to the Dead



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