AMSTERDAM -9- ALL VANISHED INTO THICK AIR

ALL VANISHED INTO THICK AIR

A woman from the 40s. Emmy Andreiss.

She saw what others wouldn’t.

In the cities, on the streets,

in the eyes, on the faces.

Looking at me, the glaze

of the glass in between.

I move aside, her eyes

questioning.

“Will you see what I saw?”

I will try, I hope I will.

From one frame to the next

begins a humble journey.

The lower half of a coat.

Two stick legs leading the eye down

to collapsed socks; no meat to hold them.

Too big, too worn shoes,

ripped up stitches.

Home to small feet

on the way to a soup kitchen.

Then come two sets of legs.

Two sets of feet.

Two sets of shoes.

One frame.

All dangling.

Legs from a platform,

feet from ankles,

shoes off feet,

laces off shoes,

long lost.

Soles almost falling off,

shoes almost falling off,

socks almost falling off,     

Kids barely holding on

to something.

Next: A man in the dumpster,

scavenging; out of place.

Should have been

lecturing to his pupils.

Wooden stick in hand,

through the filth, searching.

Not the hand, not the man.

The hand is old.

The hand is wrinkled.

The hand is determined to last.

Next is a man and a woman.

Hats too big for sunken cheeks

“Sifting ashes in search of coal remains”

whispers Emmy Andreiss.

Coal remains, home to take.

Coal remains dropped by trains.

Will drop off a woman,
one train, last frame.

A train of ruin, of shame, of pain.  

A woman of sunken cheeks,

sunken eyes, hopes lost,

dull looks, but still looks

for something lost?

Boys couldn’t grow

to fill dangling shoes.

Hand couldn’t last

to reach, to touch, to feel.

Homes of coal remains

vanished into thick air.

5/25/2012-7/24/2012

Amsterdam, NL, Jewish History Museum

A few of some 30 photos I was lucky to view in the basement of the Jewish History Museum during my visit triggered the above sentiments. Coupled with the captions that went along with the photographs, I was so saddened, seeing the last one, of a woman who made it but at what cost, who knows, made me cry. Luckily that was the highlight and also the end of my visit to this museum. I needed fresh air badly, among all, that is one feeling I remember the most. 

PS: I am dissapointed that the glass over each frame coupled with my inaptness for photo-taking (perhaps my next skill to learn should be photography), there was a lot of reflection reducing the photo quality. But there is something fun in these photos, the result of the exact same shortcoming: Let's see if you will be able to notice it...