"I escaped to be a witness."

Yala Korwin, artist and poet, was born in Poland. She survived a labor camp in the heart of Germany, and having no place to return to after the end of WWII, she let the winds carry her to France, where she lived as a refugee for ten years. In 1956 she emigrated to the United States with her husband and young children. She enrolled in college in 1965, majoring in French Literature with a minor in Art, and went on to earn a BA degree Magna Cum Laude, and then a Masters degree in Library Science. Korwin's book To Tell the Story— Poems of the Holocaust was published in 1987 by the now defunct Holocaust Library. Her poetry has been published in numerous magazines, such as Midstream, Blue Unicorn, Orphic Lute, Piedmont Literary Review, and eleven. Some of her poems found their way into important anthologies and several scholastic handbooks. 

A poem she hopes to be remembered by is "The Little Boy with His Hands Up." It has been included in the documentary film produced in Finland; discussed in an essay by M. Hirsch in Acts of Memory, published by Dartmouth College; used by Prof. R. Raskin of Denmark in his forthcoming scholarly study of the famous photograph; and included in the curriculum unit created by the Westchester Holocaust Education Center. 

To Tell the Story—Poems of the Holocaust is distributed by the U.S. Holocaust Memorial Museum, Washington, DC; is available through www.amazon.com, www.barnesandnoble.com, and from the author.  Her web site is www.yalakorwin.com.



I Lost My Mother Tongue in the War

"Only in the mother tongue can one speak his own truth."—Paul Celan

Did you say that my words sound queer?
I lost my mother tongue in the war.
I'm sorry I disturb your ear.

Some lose their limbs when they volunteer,
I lost my tongue, as I said before.
That's why my words to you sound queer.

My tongue atrophied, fate brought me here.
The new tongue's clumsy; wound's still sore.
I'm sorry I disturb your ear.

The graft succeeded. Cost me dear.
It helped, but it could not restore.
I know my words to you sound queer.

Therapy goes on, and I fear
My case is hopeless evermore.
I'm sorry I disturb your ear.

Deprived of all that I held dear,
I went through insult, hunger, gore.
I know my words to you sound queer,
But I've stopped caring about your ear.

Song Is a Monument

In the old country our bards

sang Jewish sorrows, joys

of the rich and poor

of tailors, peddlers, scholars

mothers, fathers, children

lovers, sages, fools

Their hearths extinguished

ancient shtetls vanished

only songs remain

of the multi-petalled world

each petal a promise

each petal a voice

Do not mourn them in graveyards

their ashes mantle the earth

billow in clouds

swirl in eddies of rivers

dwell in rustling of trees

whirl in gusts of wind

Do not enshrine them in stone

let them breathe with your breath

Time grinds stone to dust

breath is a cradle of song

song is a monument

song is forever

Published in Beyond Lament, ed. By M.M. Striar; Northwestern Univ. Press.



I Dreamed Him Homeward

For E.K. whose brother went down with Struma

“The small steamer Struma, with 750 Jewish refugees from

Rumania and Bulgaria aboard, was blown down to pieces

in the Black Sea about five miles north of the Bosphorus,

apparently by a stray mine…There have been no reports of

survivors.”

                           The New York Times, Feb 25, 1942

He came to say good-bye:

“My sheepskin cap fooled them,

they took me for their own.

The Iron Guard let me pass.

The others? From Prayer House

to slaughterhouse. Quartered. Hung.

One ship got through to Palestine.

There is hope. I’ll go.”

I dreamed him only from the knees down,

but knew it was my brother.

These elongated bones of youth,

so full of vigor,

yet wrapped in rotting flesh,

treaded the black-green water.

I was the raging sea.

It was my body that yielded

to spidery rolling of his limbs.

Walk, walk, my brother,

I’ll guide you where

you want to go! My voice was

a rumbling of waves.

A day after the dream,

a postcard, his hand: “We are

cooped here forever. No toilets.

Most are sick. The boat unseaworthy,

but the Turks wouldn’t let us land.

Mother pressed the letter

to trembling lips:

“Thank God. He lives.”

Walk, walk my brother

where you want to go.

No entry papers needed

anymore.

Published in Midstream and in Sarah’s Daughters Sing, ed. Henny Wenkart; publ. KTAV

You, Who Did Not Survive

Volumes have been written

to explain how they

who murdered you

came to power

and the reason for their crusade

against you.

For you—the truth lay

in black rifle-barrels

in crematorium fires.

None of you died because

of a great virtue

none because of a great sin.

You died because one dies

from exhaustion

you died because guns kill

because gas kills.

They accused you of greed

ordered you

to take off your shirts

before dying.

They extracted your gold teeth

after you died.

Published in Midstream



The Little Boy with His Hands Up

Your open palms raised in the air
like two white doves
frame your meager face,
your face contorted with fear,
grown old with knowledge beyond your years.
Not yet ten. Eight? Seven?
Not yet compelled to mark
with a blue star on white badge
your Jewishness.

No need to brand the very young.
They will meekly follow their mothers.

You are standing apart
Against the flock of women and their brood
With blank, resigned stares.
All the torments of this harassed crowd
Are written on your face.
In your dark eyes—a vision of horror.
You have seen Death already
On the ghetto streets, haven't you?
Do you recognize it in the emblems
Of the SS-man facing you with his camera?

Like a lost lamb you are standing
Apart and forlorn beholding your own fate.

Where is your mother, little boy?
Is she the woman glancing over her shoulder
At the gunmen at the bunker's entrance?
Is it she who lovingly, though in haste,
Buttoned your coat, straightened your cap,
Pulled up your socks?
Is it her dreams of you, her dreams
Of a future Einstein, a Spinoza,
Another Heine or Halévy
They will murder soon?
Or are you orphaned already?
But even if you still have a mother,
She won't be allowed to comfort you
In her arms.

Her tired arms loaded with useless bundles
Must remain up in submission.

Alone you will march
Among other lonely wretches
Toward your martyrdom.

Your image will remain with us
And grow and grow
To immense proportions,
To haunt the callous world,
To accuse it, with ever stronger voice,
In the name of the million youngsters
Who lie, pitiful rag-dolls,
Their eyes forever closed.

Published in To Tell the Story - Poems Of the Holocaust, Holocaust Publications, NY
Also published in A Child at Gunpoint by Richard Raskin, click here for more information, or to order.