Stateless Shades of the Shoah

Ilse Koch - B***h of Buchenwald

 

 

Dreams
of dread -
Buchenwald -
where the lampshades
of unblemished flesh
immortalized the Jews
forevermore for the world
in an eternity of light.
Prisoners were called "Singing Horses,"
and they sang as they marched along Blood Street.

Skinned and tanned, the corpses were discarded,
the finest Jewish leather was wrapped
around the words written in books.
Some have said that Ilse Koch
even wore the soft gloves -
B***h of Buchenwald -
her hands were cold,
her handbag
shedding
tears.

Author's Note

Ilse is a horrible icon of the Holocaust. A Nazi sadist renowned for tormenting prisoners, she was, without question, fascinated with tattooed human skin. Witnesses tell of her selecting inmates for their elaborate tattoos. Once selected, the victims were never seen again but their tattoo designs appeared on all manner of artifacts. Perhaps the most horrid artifacts of all were Ilse’s notorious human lampshades; household appliances to help us see in the dark and to help German officers read Goethe or the poetry of Schiller…

Upon liberation, General Patton forced the German citizens of nearby Weimar to march through Buchenwald and confront the stacks of corpses, the body organ samples, the crematoria – and a single human skin lampshade. When Ilse was brought to trial it was this last piece of evidence to secure the death penalty. But on the eve of Ilse’s trial – the Buchenwald lampshade disappeared.

After serving over 20 years in prison, Ilse was founded dead in her cell at Aichach on September 1, 1967. Her death, by hanging, was ruled a suicide. Today the body of the “Bitch of Buchenwald” lies in an unmarked and untended grave in the cemetery at Aichach.

Reviews

[emmajoy]

And so it should. Her so.called instructions were carried-out almost to the letter. She was evil to the core.

Having visited the Holocaust museum in Jerusalem, have read and seen documents and articles that caused grown men to cry, unashamed A billion thank yous for writing this brilliant poem and for the information above. Both need to be read.. and read.. and read.. ad infinitum.

'Under the title of Faith and Politics lie human beings deserving respect; whatever, whoever and wherever.. .. .. Those emprisoned for their history deserve immortality. EJG ' - (taken from a dissertation)'

[icelandicblue]

I know of this woman and her lampshades. I am happy you wrote this poem because we should never ever forget the brutality of that time and the genocidal policies of the Nazis. I did not know the lampshade disappeared. I did not know this whole story of her trial and death. Thank you for educating me.