Women’s Barracks, Birkenau © 2014 Martin Steingesser
October 3, 1942
Night, on my plank bed,
surrounded by women, girls
snoring, dreaming aloud,
sobbing and tossing and turning,
awake hours, the-many-too-many
impressions of a much-too-long day
washing over me. Pray,
Let me be the thinking heart,
the thinking heart for a whole
concentration camp.
—Etty Hillesum
Version by Martin Steingesser
Woman’s Barracks Plank Beds © 2014 Martin Steingesser
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