Lord, remember not only the men of good will, but also those of ill will. But do not remember all the suffering they have inflicted upon us. Remember rather the fruits we have brought, thanks to this suffering: our comradeship, our loyalty, our humility, the courage, the generosity, the greatness of heart that has grown out of this. And when they come to judgment, let all the fruits we have bourne be their forgiveness. Source: Found on a scrap of paper at the liberation of Ravensbruck Concentration Camp in Germany
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By Janet R. Kirchheimer
At The Picture Window
The snow falls
and I watch my father
shovel the driveway
and the more he shovels
the more snow
falls and he
can’t clear away
the snow and I
can’t stop the snow
from turning to ashes
before it falls to the ground.
For Ruth, My Father’s Sister
In an old black and white photograph
you looked just like Dorothy
with long, dark braids
and a small black dog on your lap.
But it was not Kansas, and
you could not click your heels
three times and go home,
you did not own
a pair of ruby slippers,
and the yellow brick road
did not lead to the gates
of the Emerald City.
It Has Been Reported
Swiss banks laundered money and gold for the Nazis.
I ask my mother if any of our relatives had money in Swiss banks.
She says no.
I ask my father.
He tells me his mother had gold in her teeth.
Opa
As a child I wished you
survived Auschwitz, survived
each selection, survived
the work details, the experiments.
I wished you were liberated at the end
of the war, were stuck behind the Iron Curtain,
had amnesia and couldn’t remember us,
or didn’t know how to find us in America.
I wished one day you’d knock on our front door
and tell me what my father was like as a boy.
Civic Duty
Welcome to jury duty.
We'll try to make this as painless
as possible, says the man in charge.
He means it as a joke.
I notice he carries a gun.
I begin to knit, knit one,
purl two, knit one, purl two,
the needles click clack.
He announces we are about to begin
the selection process.
I drop a stitch.
If I call your name report to the left.
He calls my name.
