Poems Born in Bergen-Belsen

Book excerpt: A volume of poetry in which the author confronts God, the perpetrators of the Holocaust, and the bystanders to the genocide in which six million Jews were murdered. Menachem Rosensaft also reflects on other genocides, physical separation during the COVID-19 pandemic, and why Black lives matter, among other themes that inspire the reader to make the ghosts of the past an integral part of their present and future. About the AuthorMenachem Z. Rosensaft is the associate executive vice president and general counsel of the World Jewish Congress and teaches about the law of genocide at Columbia Law School and Cornell Law School. In addition to a law degree from Columbia Law School and a master's degree in modern European history from Columbia University, he received a master's degree in creative writing from Johns Hopkins University. He is the editor of God, Faith & Identity from the Ashes: Reflections of Children and Grandchildren of Holocaust Survivors (Jewish Lights Publishing, 2015). ***Through his haunting poems, my friend Menachem Rosensaft transports us into the forbidding universe of the Holocaust. Without pathos and eschewing the maudlin clichés that have become far too commonplace, he conveys with simultaneous sensitivity and bluntness the absolute sense of loss, deep-rooted anger directed at God and at humankind, and often cynical realism. His penetrating words are rooted in the knowledge that much of the world has failed to internalize the lessons of the most far-reaching genocide in history. The son of two survivors of Auschwitz and Bergen-Belsen, Menachem, brings us face to face with his five-and-a-half-year-old brother as he is separated from their mother and murdered in a Birkenau gas chamber. He then allows us to identify with the ghosts of other children who met the same tragic fate. Poems Born in Bergen-Belsen deserves a prominent place in Holocaust literature and belongs in the library of everyone who seeks to connect with what Elie Wiesel called the "kingdom of night." Ronald S. Lauder, President, World Jewish Congress. Ever since he was a college student and in the many decades since Menachem Rosensaft has been raising difficult questions. He has rarely if ever, turned away from a fight when truth and justice were at stake. That same honesty, conviction, and forthrightness are evident in these compelling poems. His passion about the horrors of genocide, prejudice, and hatred leaves the reader unsettled. And that is how it should be. Deborah Lipstadt, Ph.D., Professor of Modern Jewish History and Holocaust Studies, Emory University. Menachem Rosensaft's luminous poetry confirms that he is not only one of the most fearless chroniclers of our factual, hard history, but also a treasured narrator of our emotional inheritance. Each of his poems is a jewel of economy, memory, and pathos, and each is a crystallized snapshot of the strained times we are living in, as well as the past moments we wish we could unlive. Share this collection with the people you care about. Abigail Pogrebin, author of My Jewish Year 18 Holidays, One Wondering Jew