to Germany where I had relatives cautionary words not to talk to anyone mustn’t
speak to anyone on that journey stormy sea arrived to a wreckage in the harbour
arrived too late for the Rheingold Express
early hours three or four small trains
in the black forest
Fortheim artificial jewellery there I saw my uncle for the first time with a nightcap on
my uncle sitting up in bed with a nightcap 1933 how pleased I was
Journey from England to Germany March 1933
by eighteen-year-old Mary Zefferett
(there are a lot of us about but very few with double t)
Mary
2007
Morris Feinmann Home
Showing posts with label racism. Show all posts
Showing posts with label racism. Show all posts
Monday, 20 April 2009
pictures speak louder
this is the story of my life
to cut a long story short
Hitler was organising Mein Kampf
Communism collapse
my grand people bombed
Hitler financed by the wealthy
the Russian revolution
Hitler used my parents from Poland
my father
my father
a marvellous caring wonderful woodworker
an artist born in wood
I was born in Hull
what happened was
after the war organised a return
Lodz a death camp people
simply thrown in
pictures speak louder
nothing left
all my grandparents
burnt nothing left
my father very skilled marvellous hands
wood must come to life
demanded in cathedrals
that he had a pony + trap
travelled all over
to this day when I still see old shafts pointing in the air
it brings my father
an old stone cottage a stable
intelligent pony he’d stamp until we fed him
my childhood memory
his hooves struck sparks
flying
Louis Marx
from Poland with a pony: a journey
2008
photo: Lois Blackburn 2008
marching to the song
my father came from the courts
said the law no longer exists
I spent the afternoon I remember
him putting a little ornament ashtray
I remember
three times in my suitcase
along the platform groups of families
on the journey a playful time
Nazi’s were
marching to the song
if the Jewish blood …
much more waiting to say
I remember my parents waving and the sandwiches
my mother had so carefully prepared
waved in her hand
April acrid spring in the air
the tune Maotzur
the hatred in the air
HM Goldberg: a journey Berlin/England
2007
Morris Feinmann Home,
said the law no longer exists
I spent the afternoon I remember
him putting a little ornament ashtray
I remember
three times in my suitcase
along the platform groups of families
on the journey a playful time
Nazi’s were
marching to the song
if the Jewish blood …
much more waiting to say
I remember my parents waving and the sandwiches
my mother had so carefully prepared
waved in her hand
April acrid spring in the air
the tune Maotzur
the hatred in the air
HM Goldberg: a journey Berlin/England
2007
Morris Feinmann Home,
a train journey Germany /1938
leaving Germany
fleetingly a relief
my father had been
in and out of jail
I have to put myself back
escaping
food matters more than
scenery
I project myself backward
train journeys
but these were
d i f f e r e n t circumstances
past holidays
here we were escaping
he was with us
that was relief
in itself
not homesick
the reverse
time projecting
my father in and out of jail
tension leaving me
we were leaving
the b o r d e r
a railway carriage
anon
2008
Photo: Lois Blackburn 2009
fleetingly a relief
my father had been
in and out of jail
I have to put myself back
escaping
food matters more than
scenery
I project myself backward
train journeys
but these were
d i f f e r e n t circumstances
past holidays
here we were escaping
he was with us
that was relief
in itself
not homesick
the reverse
time projecting
my father in and out of jail
tension leaving me
we were leaving
the b o r d e r
a railway carriage
anon
2008
Photo: Lois Blackburn 2009
a train journey Buchenwald /1938
where the train stopped
I don’t know if it was a counter or it was train station or what
anyway
everybody had to get out quickly
yknow raus raus and er and er and then had to pass this row of
SS
guards and they just hit out
blindly at anything that moved so er and then er we we arrived in the
camp
they made us sit
on the parade ground and uh they gave us a sort of fish soup to eat it was pretty horrible
but that uh that
was laced with a
strong purgative but we weren’t allowed to move from the parade ground so you can
imagine
what happened so
then er yknow eventually we were detained to our hut where we were supposed to live
after a fashion on
on wooden shelves
managed to get cleaned up a bit and er that was it they didn’t actually do
anything to us
I mean I remember the first night
the SS came in with dogs and the dogs went for anything that moved
and er yknow
if the dogs selected somebody
he was taken out and beaten up it wasn’t very pleasant
I mean
the first the first two or three nights
were really horrible then after that things settled down of course we
were all starving
but er they didn’t
do anything to us
after that some
some people
actually went onto the electric wire threw themselves on the electric wire
anon
2008
I don’t know if it was a counter or it was train station or what
anyway
everybody had to get out quickly
yknow raus raus and er and er and then had to pass this row of
SS
guards and they just hit out
blindly at anything that moved so er and then er we we arrived in the
camp
they made us sit
on the parade ground and uh they gave us a sort of fish soup to eat it was pretty horrible
but that uh that
was laced with a
strong purgative but we weren’t allowed to move from the parade ground so you can
imagine
what happened so
then er yknow eventually we were detained to our hut where we were supposed to live
after a fashion on
on wooden shelves
managed to get cleaned up a bit and er that was it they didn’t actually do
anything to us
I mean I remember the first night
the SS came in with dogs and the dogs went for anything that moved
and er yknow
if the dogs selected somebody
he was taken out and beaten up it wasn’t very pleasant
I mean
the first the first two or three nights
were really horrible then after that things settled down of course we
were all starving
but er they didn’t
do anything to us
after that some
some people
actually went onto the electric wire threw themselves on the electric wire
anon
2008
Saturday, 18 April 2009
Ought?
ought we pay less attention to the things that separate us
and pay more attention to the things we have in common
has any person any right to any part of the world
in a tribal society
- and all of us come from a tribal society -
do you think that aggression and dislike of the stranger was necessary
to survive
do you think this wholescale evil that nazism proved to be has
packed them up in cattletrucks
starved them poisoned them
and killed them in the most horrible way
I don’t think that happened before
people are substantially the same
and culture is only a local expression
rather cruel blonde men and rather substantial blonde women
history is always us
history is always what an historian puts into it
this was a feeling of utter destruction
you realise you have lost your home, your nation
it was worse than saying goodbye to my parents
gone forever not to come back
Group at Morris Feinmann Home
6 Nov 08
and pay more attention to the things we have in common
has any person any right to any part of the world
in a tribal society
- and all of us come from a tribal society -
do you think that aggression and dislike of the stranger was necessary
to survive
do you think this wholescale evil that nazism proved to be has
packed them up in cattletrucks
starved them poisoned them
and killed them in the most horrible way
I don’t think that happened before
people are substantially the same
and culture is only a local expression
rather cruel blonde men and rather substantial blonde women
history is always us
history is always what an historian puts into it
this was a feeling of utter destruction
you realise you have lost your home, your nation
it was worse than saying goodbye to my parents
gone forever not to come back
Group at Morris Feinmann Home
6 Nov 08
never to be forgotten
go through hell
its not hearsay
we’re all dying
look, I am 88 I have a pacemaker
I’ve had a stroke
the trains leading to Auschwitz
my parents
there are over 60 million who died
I have a duty to talk
there’s a lot of people who want to forget
but this is me for the rest of my life
this is me morning noon and night
the wounds are too great
this story
it’s not a story
not fiction
I come from Berlin
I won’t set foot on German soil
left on 16 April 1939
said goodbye to parents and family
never to see them again
went from Bahnhof Zoo
put on the train to Ostend
I was pulled out of the train
because I had a big J on my passport
Jewish
at the border I was stripped and I thought
England or concentration camp?
I was taken by one of these nazi officers
and stripped
I was 18 years old
I was a very protected child
humiliated
because of Kristallnacht
my father realised there was no future for Jewish people
he was pensioned off for being Jewish
it got worse
no radio
no telephone
you couldn’t go out
I was 18 years old
you couldn’t go out dancing
the first two or three years I thought in German
now I think in English
Susie Linton
6 November 2008
a conversation about trains
a little bit of history
never forget
the cattle truck
on his nineteenth birthday
my husband was sent out of Germany
his father sent him
his birthday, April 1933
the first year of the nazis
how those laws became harsher
(got his family out
father imprisoned Kristallnacht 1938
but that comes later)
33 the police were not allowed
to investigate crimes against Jews
I was born Berlin 1920
my parents perished in Auschwitz
(you’re too young, you don’t remember
not to buy goods from Jews
kosher slaughters banned
SA men standing in the door)
forever marching
before it’s too late, get them out
Kindertransport, Department of Racial Hygiene
people did not realise it was a matter of life
and death’ll blow over
1934 smoothed over for me
1935 remove human rights for Jews
it was badly reported
I was a funny little girl, liked adult conversation
I remember strange things
two people getting married because one had a permit
there was a war looming
forever marching
the storm troopers
exiled from school because I was Jewish
expelled from school because I was Jewish
of those not-pure
of the less-than-people
measured
at school, just the Jewish children
the teacher who did the measuring
said it was necessary
I hated it, the measuring
the seeds:
never forget
the cattle truck
internment camps and work camps
the heart had shrunk
when you starve people to that degree
the heart will shrink
sun snow storm
greyish blue army in the snow
prejudice first
then the science to do it
the study of a person’s character
by the shape of the head
some people would say
every era is an era of pseudo-science
take you to ?
where the Jews were separated
either to Auschwitz, or ?
my parents to ?
(my father was a very wise man
we went to Holland)
we all come from tribes
the fact that we are here means that we come from
a successful tribe
very successful, made a lot of money
didn’t marry and intermingle
people you mark as
different
(ah but we are all children of Abraham)
back
inevitably
to Hitler
people started to get rounded up
this one’s gone, this one’s gone
ask yourself: why are we here?
because we have evolved
(why do armies behave as they do - forever marching?)
the fact that we are here means that we come from
a successful tribe
this is one step of evolution
now what is the next?
I remember – I hated it
that I was being measured
why did I survive and they didn’t
why did I survive and others couldn’t
a wound that will never heal
every era is an era of pseudo-science
to understand how people can do terrible things
human
fearful
swayed
in the 1920s no money, afraid
a uniform had a huge amount of power
his hatred
did not become a passion until later
he was a loser and this is why
this badness
wasn’t good for anything
recovering from gas in a hospital when he hears of
the stab in the back
Mein Kampf in prison
writing in isolation:
in Germany I think the hatred of Jews is in-born
I’ve had it
callipers were used
a map of the head
phrenology, character and race
March 1941: Jews forbidden to leave
the final decision has been made
storm troopers
my brother didn’t want to join the last transport
it was shouted at him who killed Christ?
a little bit of history
lately as my life goes to the end
I think about it
Group poem
Morris Feinmann Home
28th November 2008
never forget
the cattle truck
on his nineteenth birthday
my husband was sent out of Germany
his father sent him
his birthday, April 1933
the first year of the nazis
how those laws became harsher
(got his family out
father imprisoned Kristallnacht 1938
but that comes later)
33 the police were not allowed
to investigate crimes against Jews
I was born Berlin 1920
my parents perished in Auschwitz
(you’re too young, you don’t remember
not to buy goods from Jews
kosher slaughters banned
SA men standing in the door)
forever marching
before it’s too late, get them out
Kindertransport, Department of Racial Hygiene
people did not realise it was a matter of life
and death’ll blow over
1934 smoothed over for me
1935 remove human rights for Jews
it was badly reported
I was a funny little girl, liked adult conversation
I remember strange things
two people getting married because one had a permit
there was a war looming
forever marching
the storm troopers
exiled from school because I was Jewish
expelled from school because I was Jewish
of those not-pure
of the less-than-people
measured
at school, just the Jewish children
the teacher who did the measuring
said it was necessary
I hated it, the measuring
the seeds:
never forget
the cattle truck
internment camps and work camps
the heart had shrunk
when you starve people to that degree
the heart will shrink
sun snow storm
greyish blue army in the snow
prejudice first
then the science to do it
the study of a person’s character
by the shape of the head
some people would say
every era is an era of pseudo-science
take you to ?
where the Jews were separated
either to Auschwitz, or ?
my parents to ?
(my father was a very wise man
we went to Holland)
we all come from tribes
the fact that we are here means that we come from
a successful tribe
very successful, made a lot of money
didn’t marry and intermingle
people you mark as
different
(ah but we are all children of Abraham)
back
inevitably
to Hitler
people started to get rounded up
this one’s gone, this one’s gone
ask yourself: why are we here?
because we have evolved
(why do armies behave as they do - forever marching?)
the fact that we are here means that we come from
a successful tribe
this is one step of evolution
now what is the next?
I remember – I hated it
that I was being measured
why did I survive and they didn’t
why did I survive and others couldn’t
a wound that will never heal
every era is an era of pseudo-science
to understand how people can do terrible things
human
fearful
swayed
in the 1920s no money, afraid
a uniform had a huge amount of power
his hatred
did not become a passion until later
he was a loser and this is why
this badness
wasn’t good for anything
recovering from gas in a hospital when he hears of
the stab in the back
Mein Kampf in prison
writing in isolation:
in Germany I think the hatred of Jews is in-born
I’ve had it
callipers were used
a map of the head
phrenology, character and race
March 1941: Jews forbidden to leave
the final decision has been made
storm troopers
my brother didn’t want to join the last transport
it was shouted at him who killed Christ?
a little bit of history
lately as my life goes to the end
I think about it
Group poem
Morris Feinmann Home
28th November 2008
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