Though I began transcribing tapes of interviews with Holocaust survivors in early 1990 for the Gratz College Holocaust Oral History Archive in Philadelphia, it was not until six years later that I wrote my first poem, "The Archivist," in response to being a part of this important historical effort. "Homeland," based on the survivor interview of Eva Bentley, was published by Midstream magazine. Others were published by European Judaism and other poetry journals. I hope you find these poems meaningful. As a Christian, I feel it is important for the Christian world to understand Jewish history and do all we can to assure nothing like what happened under Hitler will ever happen again. Poetry has a way of moving people to feel—in some small, but very personal, way—what the victims of the Holocaust suffered.
Two of the poems below, "The Archivist," and "Homeland," were published in Blood to Remember: American Poets on the Holocaust, a poetry anthology edited by Charles Fishman (Time Being Books, 2007). This new book is the re-issuing of the 1991 anthology by the same name through Texas Tech University Press.
I also recommend another anthology, Holocaust Poetry, edited by Hilda Schiff, available through Amazon.
About Lois Olena :: Contact :: Links :: Bibliography :: Articles :: Holocaust Poetry :: Judaica Poetry :: Home Page