PIGTAIL

Tadeusz Rozewicz

Translated by

ADAM CZERNIAWSKI

When all the women in the transport

had their heads shaved

four workmen with brooms made of birch twigs

swept up

and gathered up the hair

Behind clean glass

the stiff hair lies

of those suffocated in gas chambers

there are pins and side combs

in this hair

The hair is not shot through with light

is not parted by the breeze

is not touched by any hand

or rain or lips

In huge chests

clouds of dry hair

of those suffocated

and a faded plait

a pigtail with a ribbon

pulled at school

by naughty boys.

The Museum, Auschwitz, 1948

 

Tadeusz Rozewicz , a holocaust survivor, is considered one of Poland's best post-war poets.

How simple and powerful this poem is!! I have rarely come across a poem that has  touched me as closely as the one above. The horrendous clarity with which death has been depicted leaves you gasping for breath. At a first glance, the poet seems to be just a mute onlooker of the tragedy - one who has the maturity to see those bits of pins and ribbons in the dry hair of the dead bodies but not the courage to do anything about it. Slowly, the poem sinks into your system and you realize that a poem of this depth just cannot be penned down without the poet having gone though it himself. The last few tender lines leave the reader with a sense of utter sadness. The poet seems to have deliberately ended the poem at a point where the reader was just beginning to connect to it (perhaps) to deny the readers the right to prod more into the lives of the victims. Was he remorseful? Or angry?

 Loved the adjective usage  in 'clean glass' and the 'stiff hair'. The static image  conveyed in the second stanza is truly poignant.