We have reintroduced an old Write Out Loud favourite - Poem of the Month. John Coopey, one of Write Out Loud's stalwart contributors for many years, posted a belated tribute to Holocaust Memorial Day with a poem that has received a lot of admiration from his fellow poets. 'Hana Reiner, who were you?' describes his desire to know the identity and story of a young girl named Hana Reiner, a victim of Auschwitz, via a display of discarded and battered suitcases, hers being one prominently exhibited in the museum. He launches into a litany of questions, as if she were able to answer.

Such a sympathetic yet chilling poem was an easy and very worthy launchpad for our Poem of the Month and is reproduced below. Thank you, John!

 

HANA REINER, WHO WERE YOU?

by John Coopey

 

Hana Reiner, who were you?

Russian, Czech or Polish Jew?

Did promises of better lives

Become no more than cattle drives?

Did you mother bring you there?

Did they shave your head of hair?

Did they pull your teeth for gold?

Did you shiver in the cold?

Pointed left or pointed right,

Did you cry both day and night?

Had your short life just begun

Or had your lifespan overrun?

Was it quick or was it slow?

In the end how did you go?

 

No birth, no death, no age, no face

Just a name upon a case;

Were you young or were you old?

Your story never shall be told;

Forgotten life in Death's long queue

Hana Reiner, who were you?