8A Night Blog 2018

Learning about genocides these past few weeks has made a huge impact on me. I have a whole other perspective on the world because I never realized how someone could be so evil. I have always been a person to find the light in everyone and everything. It was hard for me to learn about the Holocaust because there was no good in anybody who took part in it by hurting other people and it was emotionally very harsh reading Night and learning about Elie Wiesel's horrible experience, and going to the Holocaust museum and seeing visuals. My perspective on humanity has changed. I always knew bad things happened but I never knew how extreme it could get especially learning that there were camps just for killing and people being gassed or burnt to death when they had done nothing wrong.I have taken away a lot from this unit learning about the Holocaust. The hardest part for me to understand is how somebody could be so horrible and how other countries didn't believe what was happening dur...

Hell does not last forever By: Dana Michaels Whips cracking around me Silence enveloping words With hope in our eyes Hell does not last forever Tattooed numbers A-7713 The Buna SS officers The crate With hope in our eyes Hell does not last forever Fear greater than hunger Breathing air filled with fire and smoke With hope in our eyes Hell does not last forever The pipel boy Soup tasting of corpses Long nights of tourching work Watching young children with lives ahead of them Perish Does Hell last forever

Run Faster and Faster No strength left in our bodies Keep going We must fight for our lives If we slow down Our fight is over Run From dusk till dawn Hoping That we will not collapse And what would happen if we do? Death. People going down one by one Praying That they will not be the next one to go

Vulnerable Faith Thousands of lips repeated the benediction, bent over like trees in a storm. Where is merciful God? We felt the abyss opening beneath us My eyes had opened and I was alone, terribly alone in a world without God, as he felt the first chinks in his faith, he lost all incentive to fight. and opened the door to death. God the accused. You have betrayed, allowing them to be tortured, slaughtered, gassed, and burned, I no longer accepted god’s silence God is no longer with us.

Poem: In the beginning there was faith—which is childish; trust—which is vain; and illusion—which is dangerous, Fire! The Fire! Auschwitz… nobody had ever heard that name. The death of God in the soul of a child who suddenly faces absolute evil, Flames that consumed faith, From dreams to ashes, Death of God and soul, Deprivation of the desire to live. Muster your strength, And keep your faith. What are you my God, Why do you go on troubling these poor people's wounded minds, their ailing bodies? I have faith in the Jewish people, In Israel, Let it be given a chance, And those who kept silent yesterday will remain silent tomorrow.

The Night Always expected The paralyzing silence Voices silencing and breaking But the Night Such a blessing Shielding the innocents from monsters Monsters that perhaps were once human The monsters hated the night Going back from were they came from under the cover of Night In the morning hell awakened Forced to live in this living hell The devil's themselves awakened No love No family Every man for himself Back to the Night All hope was in the Night The monsters slept in the Night Everyone slept Either for the Night or forever Everyone slept In the perfect Night

A Jewish Family That is what we are No different from others Not better or worse Not more generous or cheaper Equal Not stronger or weaker Not smarter or dumber We are equal The same as everybody else Some people do not know history, So they are doomed to repeat it But in reality We are equal And that’s that

Never shall I forget that night, the first night in camp, that turned my life into one long night seven times sealed.  It was like a page torn from a book  Like a dream in the first hours of dawn We felt the abyss opening beneath us We were all condemned to the same fate- still unknown  Finally, our illusions devoured us Consumed us I was face to face with the angel of death I don’t know how I survived Never shall I forget that smoke. Fire! I see a fire! I see a fire! We saw the flames rising from a tall chimney against a black sky Fire! I see a fire!  Jews look! Look at the fire! Look at the flames! Hunger-Thirst-Fear-Selection-Fire-Chimney And then, there was nothing, only the darkness of night Never shall I forget the small faces of the children whose bodies I saw transformed into smoke under a silent sky. Wide, dreamy eyes  Divine suffering The children and their fear  He caused thousands of children to burn in His mass graves ...

The Community, Too weak too defeated, Neighbors deprived of joy, Deprived of hope, Of confidence. Then came Ghettos of destructive flames and fire, Reassuring the rumors of our tragic fate. Anxious children burned, slaughtered, and gassed. Children turning into ashes. The barbed wire, The tensions, The terror, The ghetto, This is my grave. This is the grave of defeated Jews, And defeated children. Together, we are stuck. Together we are brave. Together, our wounded minds may heal. Separated, misery and decay overcome us bringing out the cowardice inside. The hope of healing our wounded minds burned through us, Through our despair, The flame inside us desiring healing, Burned brighter than the flames of the children's graves. Why had god betrayed us? What did we do wrong? Are you there God?

flames the chimneys of the crematorium stood tall like a withered tree calling my name huge flames rising men women children thrown into the flames bodies transformed into smoke we were all people condemned to the same fate we marched forward very close to us were the pit and its flames we were face to face with the Angel of Death

If in my lifetime I was to write only one book this would be the one Why did I write it? A legacy of words To help prevent history from repeating itself Was it simply to preserve a record I don’t know how I survived I did nothing to save myself “What do you expect that’s war?” Days went by. Then weeks then months You cannot understand There was nothing. Only the darkness of night. Turned into ashes We stood stunned, petrified You’re heading for the crematorium Could this be a nightmare? An unimaginable nightmare. Children thrown into flames All this could not be real Was I awake? I felt anger rising within me Master of the universe What was there to thank him for I succeed in coming back I am alone No one is listening to me

 SMOKE          I had lost my mind.      Still in Kabbalistic dreams      Raining fire      rings of black      smoke      the whole world on fire              never shall I forget that      smoke.          the small faces of the children now just      Smoke      The smell of burning     poisoned the air and stung the throat.     turned dreams to ashes     not to forget for as long as god lives     Never to forget that     smoke      ...

Faith Something that can be Lost But can also be Received For in the Holocaust Faith was being Lost At some instances Faith seemed all gone For there was nothing more To live for But at the end Their faith Was back once more

My friends of yesterday pass me by, Toward the gate of the ghetto, Silently weeping. My heart trembles; The look in their eyes Frightens me. Together, We walk toward the station Under a summer sun. I begin to wonder: Could this be just a nightmare? How is it possible? Standing on the station platform Under a blazing sun, We climb into The convoy of cattle cars, Waiting Like an open tomb. Eighty persons in each one, Eighty persons Abandoned by the whole world. We pretend That we are not, For what if one of us still did believe. A prolonged whistle pierces the air. The wheels begin to grind. Something inside me feels the need to cry. For unfulfilled hopes, extinguished futures. Dreams, Burned to a cinder, turned into ashes, Devoured by a black flame. I look back. The ghetto Disappears over the horizon. Ahead of us, Da...