Explore and Reflect on a Theme through an Original Piece

Recently I read Night by Elie Wiesel and Maus by Art Spiegelman.  Both of these books recount terrifying accounts of the holocaust.  In my English class, we were presented with the task of creating a Holocaust museum exhibit that would help people to "never forget" the horrors that took place and show how, unfortunatley, genocide still remains in the 21st century.  When reflecting on the museum exhibits and the book Night, I felt that the desire to hate someone because their different was a constant theme.  In one of the exhibits: Hitler Youth, the display described how young kids were taught to hate Jews early on, so they could toughen up and keep the Jews oppressed.  Another display: Modern Genocide talked of the Rwandan Genocide which was started because one tribe hated that an opposing tribe had more power than them.  Lastly the display: Holocaust Poems showed a poem entitled Holocaust written by Sudeen Pagedar was written from the perspective of a person trying to explain to a ten year old boy that he needs to fear dying because he is hated by Germans because he is a Jew.  The theme hate also relates to the book Night because Elie talks about how the German soldiers were so desensitized to the killing being done because Hitler had filled them with so much hate.

In this Poem I have embodied hate and personified it-as if it were a person:

When I Hate

I wake up at the crack of dawn ready to strike,

Evil falls upon my mind, it cuts with all its might,

I want to fight you because you just don’t look right.

I ride into the sunset, where my emotions burn,

When I’m prepared and ready,

My lesson you will learn.

My shadow falls upon you and shows my glistening knife,

All emotions have grown cold

As I take your life.

Terrified to believe in me you scream with all your might,

I laugh away all feelings,

As I drag you in the night.

I force your family out, with my iron grip,
The separation tears at your heart like a cracking whip

I slowly turn away from you, in a successful way.

I hear an agonizing moan and quickly turn around,

I thought that I had killed you, who dares to make a sound,

Blood is dripping down the side, all that’s left to see,

Is that sightless face, staring right at me.

Click to read Holocaust Poem - Click to learn more about Hitler Youth - Click to read about Rwandan Genocide