#camps poems on Hello Poetry

nick armbrister Feb 2020

Where is the mass transit sending people to?
Dispatch of souls to places unknown
See the loading ramp down by the barracks
A place to herd them into vehicles
What type vehicles and for what use?
A bus to drive them to a spar resort
A truck to take them to the firing squad
A space shuttle to take them off world
A plane to ferry them to a new colony
All this and more to relocate humans
Orders given from up above carried out
Adding up the numbers of people shifted
Under command of the always ready soldiers
Commanded by a ruthless ******* officer
Look back into the past and compare
Just like the trains at the death camps
Remember what happened then
History repeats itself over and over

#camps #people #genocide #transit

Jay Sep 2018

Paradise Lost in Cages and Ruined Superstores

oh, little ones
if I could build you a worthy city
to keep you safe and dreaming
I would crush the hope I had left
into a powder,
mix it
with all the things we grown couldn't be
and lay the slurry out to set,
harden it with sun and air
not hate
forming a foundation
where futures could be built
oh,
but my tools have no power
I dented them in fury and shorted them in tears
before they could be used to build

oh, little ones
if ever I find safety in this homeless land
I'll wrap you in it
in a heartbeat

realizing you don't have the resources to help every worthy cause can be heartbreaking

6/19 update- It breaks my heart that this is still relevant

#poetry #current #events #news #cages #separation #pain #healing #border #camps

Sherry Asbury Jul 2015

Ghosts of Glory

They came to Auschwitz and Treblinka...
they tore down the walls that confined us.
How we wept with joy as the SS officers
were taken away - we spit in their path,
those of us still able to call up sputum
from lungs tortured with malnutrition
and iron beds that bore no blankets
for our bones.

My sleeves are covering the number
they burned into my arm, taking away
my humanity and rendering me nothing.
A young soldier takes my arm,
kisses the hated brand;
he has tears in his eyes as he
tells me he is from Texas...there are
no other words he can pull from his
young, shocked brain.

When you see this picture -
remember these words:
“All it takes for evil to flourish
is for good men to do nothing”.

#death #hope #nazis #camps

Life Jan 2015

Arbeit Macht Frei (***** work will get you killed)

Would you believe me to be death?
I guess it makes sense
For this reality, truly is hell

But I am a cheater of death
So here I stand;
Amidst the stink of burning corpses,
Dead eyes of starring, children and women,
Alive.
Oh, but how I wish I was dead.

Now, 80 years after,
The smell of burned carcass,
Still clings to everything I touch

"Arbeit macht frei" (German pronunciation: [ˈaɐ̯baɪt ˈmaxt ˈfʁaɪ]) is a German phrase meaning "work makes (you) free". The slogan is known for having been placed over the entrances to a number of **** concentration camps during World War II, including most infamously Auschwitz.

#war #world #2 #second #**** #auschwitz #imprisonment #concentration #camps #2ww

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