NEW WORK
Visiting Auschwitz is an obligation. If you live in Europe, it's part of your story. If you were brought up in the Christian or the Jewish Religion, you need to know what religious faith does to people's perceptions of others, and what has been done on your behalf in the past.
I shall never forget my moment of arrival at Birkenau, nor the long walk down the ramp, past the burnt out remains of the men's camp, to the ruins of the gas chambers. 4 million others, 60 years ago did not survive to remember.
I wanted to visit the theme immediately, but in some de-personalised way. I hit upon two narratives to start, written by imagined Germans. Poland Train, the first, describes a railway engineer, and his thoughts as he drives a train of strangers to Birkenau.
Poland Train
The stench of our train in the darkness.
An angry fire consumes poor coal,
the needles shake and shiver, steam
escapes from worn out valves. We are
delivering, but are no express. I wipe
a gauge: a tear of condensation offends
a tidy footplate. The fireman, who, thanks
to war and careless rostering, I do not
know, leans back, resites his cap.
A tender moment, shovel propped.
His throat is full. Expertly, he rolls
the blackened phlegm and spits
it to the night, then checks the firebox.
Momentarily transfixed, the burst
of light records a figure trapped in hell,
then vanishes with a clang of steel.
On time, I utter. The watch that was
My father's put away. No matter what
the load, the line's end, or how long
the wait while other transports clear
the ramp, we will be there as scheduled.
The darkness war has brought's complete.
We scurry through, and hope to be
invisible. The rush of steam, the wailing
track beneath the wheels, that's our simple
universe. Mechanics! And, within
the blackened comet of our tail
we carry with us to its end,
Conspiracy that time and debt had lent
a false respect. Jews! I hear
my father’s voice again, the pounded
Sunday fist, the engineer’s skilled
hand bunched in hatred of a race
that killed his Lord. We have them now.
Their stench is what we trail across
this land. Like trapped flies, brushed
from an unwashed corpse. Deliverance
is certain. Justice fixed at last.
And yet I stiffen at the thought. Can it
be such guilt as theirs is worth
so large an enterprise? My father’s
hand was hard enough to beat
his sinless sons as well. We take
on water, at some Polish halt
that only needs a decent German
name to make it whole again.
I listen to the boxcars' groans,
the slow and mournful songs, the pleas
for what I cannot understand.
I thank God I am no sentimental
man, or I would weaken at the thought
Of what I do, of what I know
that must be done. It is their last,
and quickly too. We do not linger.
This final night will take them to
the ramp beyond the arch. Then peace
for them, the rest for us. I’d get
this ancient train to give more speed,
and help them on their way
If it was not too old, and only
fit for scrap. We are not cruel.
It is for all the best. This ends
in morning, for a world they helped to make,
which now demands a final sacrifice.
