Judy DeCroce
Bearing Witness
Bergen-Belsen’s Liberation)
Once, the men were strong
women pretty
the young used to know how to play.
It used to be enough.
Before, I sold books,
and had a good store.
These eyes look down
walking through hell,
watching, waiting
never really sleeping.
I could recite full passages.
Thin figures in striped pajamas
we who wore despair while
typhus and starvation
erased our names.
Now it’s seventy years after I left the camp,
that camp that never left me.
Look…a cardinal!
Spring again!
About the writer:
Judy DeCroce is an internationally published poet, flash fiction writer, and educator. She has been published by Plato’s Cave online, The Poet Magazine, Amethyst Review, North of Oxford, The BeZine, along with many journals and anthologies. Judy is also a professional storyteller and teacher of that genre. She lives and works in upstate New York with her husband poet /artist, Antoni Ooto.
Image: Symphony of Destiny by Li Chevalier (1961-). No medium specified. No size specified. 2012. By free license.
