People are staring up desperately towards a light just
beyond their reach, utter despair etched across their faces. Behind the masses
of emaciated bodies lies a wall constructed of human skulls. People cling to
each other for comfort that refuses to come. Children weep in the arms of their
mothers, while the mothers themselves hopelessly embrace their children with a
look of such sorrow, one knows that they only wish they could save their
children and know the more dreadful truth that they cannot. Smoke rises up from a barrel of coals which
bears the inscription SS, and etched into the wood just below the heel of one
figure that looks more like a corpse than a man, is the Star of David.
This is
the genocide of millions, summarized in one event. This is the final solution
that brought only horror and grief. This is the holocaust. This is the gas
chamber of some desolate concentration camp that would be better called a
torture camp, where hatred is bred and allowed to flourish amongst the sadistic
keepers of the helpless victims. Those caught in the chamber of death, who only
moments before had prayed for death, now desperately cling to a life they know
will soon end, realizing just how much they truly want to live, how much their
instincts for survival still rule them. In pain from the hunger, the brutal
gasses restricting their breath, they feel the ultimate torment, that of
deprivation, of lacking. In their final moments, some weep and beg to be let
live. Others stand stoically, attempting to be strong, the misery still clear
in their expression. All of them gasp for breath, less frequently
as time goes on, until all drop dead from the poison pumped mercilessly into
their lungs.
The
bodies will be used. They may be used as fuel, or soap, or even lampshades.
Some will simply be thrown in ditches or ovens belching black and ominous
smoke. In the end, everything throughout is a symbol of oppression, and for the
more despairing among the oppressed, of hopelessness, of the end of a race, but
more importantly, the end of a life.
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