Hungarian Jewish children and an elderly woman on the way to the death barracks of Auschwitz-Birkenau, ca. May 1944

“From the chimneys of the Vatican, white smoke rises,
a sign the Cardinals have chosen themselves a Pope.
From the crematoria of Auschwitz, black smoke rises,
a sign the conclave of Gods hasn’t yet chosen,
the Chosen People.
After Auschwitz, no theology:
the inmates of extermination bear on their forearms
the telephone numbers of God,
numbers that do not answer
and now are disconnected, one by one.
After Auschwitz, a new theology:
the Jews who died in the Shoah
have now come to be like their God,
who has no likeness of a body and has no body.
They have no likeness of a body and they have no body.”
– Smoke by Jacob Glatstein

January 5, 2015 | Categories: History, Holocaust, Human History, Images of History, Life under siege, Modern Warfare, Nightmares of World War II, Photography, World War Two | Tags: Adolf Hitler, black and white photography, Death, Europe, German, Germany, historic, Historical, History, Hitler, human history, Military, Military history, Nazi, Photo, Photography, Society, War, Warfare, World History, World War two, WW2, wwii | Leave a comment