There is a distinction I make between the public Holocaust memorial and the private Holocaust sense. For me, I try to distance myself from the public. I didn’t want to watch the ceremony and preferred a stupid series instead – especially since I feared the event would become political in some way. And indeed it did – Our PM reminded us of his responsibility for the vaccination drive, I was told again and again in the news.
As the evening began, thoughts and memories came to me – new recollections filled my mind. Here’s one example:
absence
“What are you looking for?”
We’d ask Mother, as she rummaged
A cupboard or a drawer or the phone book.
“My lost youth,” she’d answer
Absent-mindedly, having forgotten
Whatever had occupied her mind
When she first began to search.
The bombs, the soldiers, the streets
Covered with bodies, the story of the children
Smashed against the wall, her babies
Washed down the drain in the bathtub in Danzig
They were always
Right there in the cupboard, the drawer,
The book next to the telephone.
This morning both Ezi and I stayed home to work on banal red tape – we stayed in our different rooms and didn’t discuss anything. But when the siren sounded I stood in the doorway at attention and found myself looking into a mirror where I could see Ezi standing at attention as well. We were, it seems, both in our private Holocaust thoughts.