Marta married an American soldier
in the front lines of her liberation
from Nazis who invaded her city
where her father’s butcher shop
did business selling cuts of meat
from the cattle raised on their farm
outside the city, somewhat removed
from the war which rounded up neighbors,
Jews, whose shops also served Dutch
neighbors who labored by their sides.
As German soldiers arrived under Nazi flags
These Dutch, Jew and non-Jew, stayed silent
coming out from their shops to watch them march by.
Soon, rumors were heard that non-Jewish shopkeepers
were considering turning Jews in by-and-by
to save and serve their own interests.
Marta’s father knew better. He knew the lie
they told themselves that such hate
could pass them all by, by cooperating.
In the morning the Jewish shops were shuttered.
The Jews had been warned and fled
to no one knew where. On a wing and a prayer
they followed twelve year old Marta
to the family farm where they hid in the barn,
protected and fed, and where they could safely hide.
The Nazis came and took their cattle, their chickens,
but did not find the Jews who were kept hidden,
kept alive. Marta’s family stayed silent, too.
Not to save themselves, nor appease their enemy;
but to save their Jewish neighbors and their own pride.
Years fell away with wizened flesh that kept them alive.
When the food was gone into Nazi bellies
she ate grass soup, and chewed leather hide
from her shoes, made into stews. It kept them alive.
By the time American soldiers took over her town
Marta was an emaciated bag of skin and bone.
She married the soldier who fed her his rations
and gave her rebirth of heart. She had kept her soul.
She had saved the Jews and her love of humanity.
But her sanity sat heavily on thin shoulders
no longer able to stem tears nor fears.
She heard those marching feet and shouts of “Heil !”
In forever dreams she relived the living hell
she and her Jewish neighbors survived.
annarino writes 