Monument

Dachau; Light at the end of the tunnel, still enclosed, not free

Sometime during the week, I had a little discussion with some colleagues about concentration camps. One of them exclaimed at how is it even possible to treat another human being in such a cruel manner. I echo her sentiment but I am not the least shocked. The human powers of rationalization makes almost any act possible. All that is needed is a blind eye and an overly rational mind. I suppose that is why we are endowed with a soul or for atheist, a conscience; to keep the rationalization process in check. The conversation evoked memories of visits to Auschwitz and Dachau. The room full of hair, the gas chambers. Even abattoirs are more humane.

Here war is simple like a monument:
A telephone is speaking to a man;
Flags on a map assert that troops were sent;
A boy brings milk in bowls. There is a plan

For living men in terror of their lives,
Who thirst at nine who were to thirst at noon,
And can be lost and are, and miss their wives,
And, unlike an idea, can die too soon.

But ideas can be true although men die,
And we can watch a thousand faces
Made active by one lie:

And maps can really point to places
Where life is evil now:
Nanking; Dachau.

~W.H. Auden