holocaust remembrance

my people came out
of the shtetls and ghettos of eastern europe
where we made boots and sheet metal patterns
and socialists and anarchists

and numbering in the millions

we made music and poems
and curiosity
before all of europe
and the united states
turned on us
and then turned us in

in order to cover their own

intellectual malevolence
they stole our zeitgeist
(maybe even the word)
take it from the yids they would say
before we cleanse them from the university
before we turn them to ash

so don't tell me how you forgot

to use the word jew
it's a simple yet complex word
it's been buried inside of you
since at least the 1492 inquisition

bring yourself and your ancestors

to your impeachment hearing
the truth might set you free

--- e b bortz