Hunger Camp At Jaslo Poem by Wislawa Szymborska

'Hunger Camp At Jaslo' by Wislawa Szymborska is an act of genocide in an open field. The poet declares Write it. Write. In ordinary ink on ordinary paper: they were given no food, they all died of hunger. All. How many? It's a big meadow. How much grass for each one? Write: I don't know. Such powerful emotive images in simple words, the details, 'they all died of hunger' gives an indication of the duration of their suffering. The questions, 'All. How many? ' and 'It's a big meadow. How much grass/ for each one? ' indicates the scale of this inhuman slaughter. The killing is calculated cruelty, cold impersonal, which the poet writes in an illustrative form indicating we shall never know details of their personalities, starvation murdered lives, with the words Write: I don't know. History counts its skeletons in round numbers. A thousand and one remains a thousand, which leads to the rounding off of this atrocity as impersonal impartial figures, mass murder as mere indifferent figures on a page. The juxtaposition of these words with personalized verse tracing back the uncounted one to the expectations, hopeful joys of pregnancy to birth, to early childhood ABC, the laughs cries, growing into emptiness is brilliantly defined as as though the one had never existed: an imaginary embryo, an empty cradle, an ABC never read, air that laughs, cries, grows, emptiness running down steps toward the garden, nobody's place in the line seems to depict a young child; viciously murdered through deliberate prolonged starvation. In the second stanza, nature bears witness to this crime, with focus upon the selected chosen scene of mass murder, where we are taken included with the words 'We stand in the meadow where it became flesh'; the flesh of our corpses will litter this field but 'the meadow is silent as a false witness./ Sunny. Green. Nearby, a forest'. Thus we are told this crime is not hidden in a dark hidden location, but committed in the open in a beautiful sunny place. The struggle of the suffering starving trying to survive is vividly described as ... a forest with wood for chewing and water under the bark- every day a full ration of the view until you go blind. Freedom life is viewed observed, in the envy of a bird free to fly away to live, to escape this place of skeletal encroaching death with Overhead, a bird- the shadow of its life-giving wings brushed their lips. This image quickly turns to nightmare scavenging, as birds eat flesh around heads, the 'life-giving wings' which 'brushed their lips'; turns to scavengers feeding upon human corpses, eating flesh lips down to the teeth as 'Their jaws opened./ Teeth clacked against teeth' reveals. Even the glorious moon becomes a motif of death because 'At night, the sickle moon shone in the sky/ and reaped wheat for their bread.' The moon nightly illuminates mass murder, sickle harvests their bodies. A ghostly disembodied image of hunger is the haunting line, 'Hands came floating from blackened icons, / empty cups in their fingers.' A concentration camp image of electrified imprisonment wire, confining this dehumanized humanity is graphic On a spit of barbed wire, a man was turning. The planning of this mass death is as precise as the barbecue roasting of a pig. 'They sang with their mouths full of earth' could have a major twofold meaning, in starvation they tried to eat earth in hunger and died, also depicting, corpses buried in earth. These atrocities cannot be dismissed with the excuse this is war as the line A lovely song of how war strikes straight at the heart. declares. We are left with the final words Write: how silent. Yes. These words are an accusation directed at governments, which knew these atrocities were happening and did nothing, and against all the silent witnesses, and the murdering perpetrators of the crime. The poem is masterful 10+++

A lovely narrative poem nicely penned. Thanks for sharing.

Powerful poem... and clearly an excellent translation...

Hunger Camp At Jaslo by Wislawa Szymborska is a poem of awareness and conscience of mankind not to repit again.

A lovely narration on awareness and human conscience. 10++++ for the sharing. To quote you A thousand and one remains a thousand, as though the one had never existed: an imaginary embryo, an empty cradle, an ABC never read, air that laughs, cries, grows, emptiness running down steps toward the garden, nobody's place in the line.

as if by someone who was there and ate from that wire

Such a profound poem by Wislawa Szymborska👍👍👍

In their fingers! ! Thanks for sharing this poem with us.

Millions who hunger and thirst after such cruel war, oh send us back into our place, and keep us there immured until we have perished of hunger..........such a poignant write expressed so wistfully......thanks for sharing

Very impressive poem, an honest poem, a warning: NEVER to be repeated! And of course I enclose here CONGRATULATIONS for this Modern POEM of The DAY, her family can always read these words Wislawa created.added with the wishes of course. Excellently translated. A TEN for Wislawa. Sincerely, Sylvia Frances Chan.