TREE OF LIFE
They killed us on the banks of the Danube
and in the ovens of Auschwitz.
They killed us in our homes
and they killed us in the woods.
They killed us in the heat of summer
and the coldest cold of winter.
They killed us pleading to God
and they killed us
as we lay in the mud.
They killed us when we were children
and they killed us when we were old
and too exhausted to weep.
They killed us
and they continue to kill us.
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John Guzlowski’s poems and personal essays about his parents’ experiences as slave laborers in Nazi Germany appear in his memoir Echoes of Tattered Tongues. He is also the author of the Hank and Marvin mystery novels (Kasva Press) and a columnist for the Dziennik Zwiazkowy, the oldest Polish newspaper in America. His most recent books of poems are Mad Monk Ikkyu and True Confessions.