Auschwitz Memorial, Jan 2010

AUSCHWITZ LIBERATION MEMORIAL

By Susumu Takiguchi

It was on a Saturday and about 9 o’clock in the morning when the Russians of the reconnaissance unit of the 100^th Infantry Division first set foot on the ground of one of the Nazi concentration camps in Poland, the prisoner’s infirmary in Monowitz. About 3 o’clock in the afternoon, Auschwitz, Birkenau and Monowitz were all liberated. There was some resistance from the retreating German army and 231 Red Army troops lost their lives, two of them before the gates of the Auschwitz main camp. It was on 27 January, 65 years ago.

On the 60^th anniversary of the liberation of the Nazi German Auschwitz Extermination Camp, I wrote sequences of haiku on this theme, which is presented in this issue as a reprint. My motive to write them was complex. Apart from the strong urge from within and without to express sentiments about it from the point of view of an individual of different nationality, generation and culture, technically it was also an attempt at testing haiku if it could hold, sustain and cope with such hard themes as this. My main messages in the poems should be clear but one of them was eloquently repeated on the 27 January anniversary ceremony this year in the words of Wladyslaw Bartoszewski, chairman of the International Auschwitz Council to the effect that capacity of opposing evil does not result from knowledge about the existence of evil, but rather from the moral condition of every one of us.

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THE END OF THE LINE – The Sixtieth Anniversary of the Auschwitz Liberation

Echo on Serge Tome’s Cry (In saluting to and in praise of this brave poet)

By Susumu Takiguchi

* * *

snow falls endlessly

on the railway tracks…

leading nowhere

the end of the line

where human beings

perished

treated as sub-human

by self-appointed super-humans…

one winter too many

prejudice and violence

matched by paranoia and

inferiority complex reversed

neither summer grass

nor winter snow can

hide its shame

two rusty iron rails

lit by countless candle lights

show up failed final solution

sixty years on…

even the bitter cold,

not deterring survivors

this sixtieth anniversary…

liberation of the unthinkable;

but what do we celebrate?

as dusk takes over,

braziers at the camp fence lighted,

whipping winter wind

red brazier lights loom…

like victims’ haunting eyes,

yet like evil eyes also

with the unblinking eyes

survivors look into the darkness,

their eyebrows white with snow

face the dead and survived,

even writing a line of poetry

feels sinful and disrespectful

but what can strangers do?

especially from other nations?

and from other generations?

a European affair? Yes, but…

but it’s our affairs too; cut ourselves,

blood spews from our wound

love us, we love back;

hate us, we hate back;

despise us, we despise back

a 20th century affair? Yes, but…

Auschwitz was not unprecedented,

nor has it been un-repeated

atrocities are no monopoly;

they may differ in size or appearances

but share the same cause

as snowfall does not end,

so Auschwitz will happen again,

unless humanity ends

no one in conflicts

wishes to be compared

with the Nazi

none of little-Hitlers

wishes to be identified as or compared to

the greatest incarnate of evil

so many modern religious wars,

so many contemporary political conflicts

share so much with this man’s war

and yet such comparisons

have become a new taboo:

a sure cause of troubles

Auschwitz is a complex issue;

difficult to unravel or comprehend but…

but, a best textbook of humanity

thoughts wander and linger

around why we’ve failed to learn lessons

even from the Auschwitz?

like the Great Tsunami,

I wouldn’t presume to understand

the Holocaust

but as I paint small waves,

I try to understand it in ways

I know how

not in dozens or hundreds

but I have a few individuals

whom I hate personally

these hateful faces,

whenever I think of them

I think of Auschwitz

when I am angry

I try to look into the mirror

and gaze at what I see

when I see conflicts

I look into each party’s own causes

leading to such collisions

whenever anyone criticises

or attacks someone else, I rather

scrutinise the attacker

when a whistle-blower

begins to be victimised, I will

begin to take him/her seriously

when people become in denial,

or try to save their own skin, or fudge

I start to be nervous

when someone starts to preach

I turn my back against him/her,

checking on the preacher

when someone crosses

the point of moderation, I make myself

agitated and alert

I have trained myself hard

to be able to detect any falsehood

like a drug-sniffing dog

I look into underlying motives,

especially ulterior or selfish ones,

behind people’s behaviour

I spend time not to gain satori

but to spot the very point where

normality turns into fanaticism

never trust any government;

not a bad starting point, be a

contrarian; another

cast a fundamental doubt

to fundamental fallacies accepted

as fundamental truths

men are never created equal;

making the contrary a starting point

is a cause of many contradictions

to treat them as if they were

is what distinguishes man from beast

and a base of civilisation

the Nazi flouted this wisdom,

one of the few noblest achievements

of otherwise flawed humanity

deluding themselves

that they were a super race

was normal madness

declaring

that Jews were sub-humans

was abnormal madness

exterminating them

on the greatest racial prejudice

was madness beyond comprehension

attempts at playing god

often end up in calamities;

maybe god’s wrath!

the Auschwitz survivors

are dying; soon there will be none, so are

others of their generation

collective memory

and collective sense of guilt:

fading or vanishing

little-Hitlers are everywhere,

little-collaborators, little-sympathisers

and connivance abound

stop these little ones

or you will have another Auschwitz,

not an empty threat

the Nazi pushed human history

back to barbarism as their dogma

contained fundamental flaws

but many of us have committed

similar mistakes: the Japanese military,

Stalin, the British Empire…

The Serge Tome’s list,

chilling and uncomfortable,

indicts today’s atrocities

the fundamental understanding

should be: that all of us are capable of

everything, including atrocities

each one of us

has all capabilities, good and evil,

potential or overt

if we deny this

we still do not know

much about humanity

snow keeps falling

at Auschwitz, buttercups will

flower in spring

neither of them

can hide the shame of

all human beings

the shame should be seen,

talked about and exposed,

to be shared by us all

otherwise, the evil

in the darkest corner of our mind

would be out again

we must have dominion

over the devil within us, by keeping

our immune system strong

the beauty of snow

contrasts the lowest degradation,

at Auschwitz