He wanted to be remembered.
He wanted to live out his life
happily.
He had the
ambitions of a young man
at the beginning of a long life.
But all around him was death.
German soldiers barking orders.
People disappearing after
early morning showers.
His entire family shot in the head
right in front of him.
Their possessions now occupying the cold
corners of a warehouse filled with
stolen lives.
There were
rumors that nothing was wasted.
They were harvesting Jews like pigs
he'd overheard a guard boast,
"Everything but the squeal..."
Gold fillings made into new jewelry.
Human hair styled into new wigs.
Human skin made into lampshades.
Soon the boy's ambition
became the singular candle
keeping the wick
of his young life burning.
One day he began to notice
the growing piles of human bodies.
Desperation set in.
"How do I get out?"
he asked.
"I must leave here."
he told himself.
"I want to end up in the land of the living!"
He studied the soldiers at work...
first stripping the gaunt diseased bodies,
then piling them onto trucks that
eventually left the barb-wired camp.
"Is there something more than death that
will get me out of here?"
It was then he realized he'd asked
the right question.
After midnight, he left the barracks.
Slowly he crawled his way to the growing
pile of bodies.
Stripping out of his shabby rags,
he laid down among them.
He remained very still.
Focusing his mind on freedom
made him forget the biting cold
and the continual sounds of the soldiers at work.
Bodies soon piled on top of him.
The weight and the stench
became unbearable.
Inside his head
he replaced the stench with
thoughts of steaming hot soup
and fresh brown bread.
All the while words started
to become sentences, sentences,
paragraphs; he began to dictate a
story of his escape,
the words calming him.
Soon he felt his body lifted
scooped in with the others.
He heard the grinding of the gears
of the truck as its motor strained
the whining making a long echo into the night.
Many hours later,
as he pushed the bodies away,
he blessed all of them,
saying the prayer of the dead,
but glad he was not among them.
Looking skyward he found stars
and his courage.
"I will be a writer,"
he began to tell himself.
In knowing the right questions,
Jakob found his freedom.
Years later,
many wise people have read and enjoyed
his books
some of them having been made into films.
Copyright March 19 2012. Based on listening to a true story.
Melissa A Howells Meloo of Tilt-a-World
