Jesus' Round up
Ilan Braun
Firmly sewn on his heart
The yellow star pounded
But I am a Christian!
He shouted
To the New Order’s policemen
Before, I was wearing a cross
Not a star
& the henchmen
of the worst to come to sneer
Jesus has been betrayed by his own kind
Praise-worthy parishioners
Picked-up at the church’s exit
& off with you, in this bus direction: Drancy!
One-way, nearly free of charge
Return, missing
In the vast court-yard
A crowd so dense & no one to recognize him
Here, Babel
Swarming with strange tongues
& shouts
& yet so many Jews so many stars flashing
on the greyish concrete firmament
A pen-pusher brass-hat writing down names
& meticulously , stacking them up
in thick black columns
& the dark blood of his scrawling pen
staining the paper
& splashing up, infamously & crudely a few names
Jesus ?
Yes, Jesus, from Nazareth in Palestine
Born in the year zero
Occupation ?
Messiah
Hurry, hurry up!
You’re not the last
Thus, from Drancy,
Jesus left
In a hellish train A barbed-wire crown on his head
Drancy is the camp near Paris where Jews were “herded” just before
being sent to Auschwitz
E-mail: Rufina Bernardetti Silva Mausenbaum
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Rufina Bernardetti Silva Mausenbaum