Subjugation

In the spring of 1940,
in the season of renewal and birth,
twenty two thousand men gasped their last defiant breath
as bullets exploded in their heads.

Now, frozen in bronze,
the Katyn Pieta kneels before
the powerful wings and sword of the Angel of Death,
cradling one of the fallen dead.

There’s a hole
in the back of his skull;
behind his back, his hands are tied
and there’s pain in the Pieta’s eyes,
while Death’s face is hidden by a hood.
This monument cannot be misunderstood.

Kim M. Russell, 2016

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The monument to the Victims of the Katyn Forest Massacre, designed by Warsaw sculptor Tadeusz Tchórzewski, was unveiled in 2000 and can be found in the park next to the Racławice Panorama in Wroclaw.

My response to dVerse Poets Pub Meeting the Bar – Caravaggio and Chiaroscuro

Björn is the host for today’s dVerse Poets Pub Meeting the Bar, in which he has continued with his series on movements in art; he has moved back in time to the early seventeenth century and one of the most influential artists ever: Caravaggio. He has given us some factual background and a picture as inspiration of ‘Judith Beheading Holofernes’. He has also explained the technique called chiaroscuro (light-dark) that is very much connected with Caravaggio. The technique, which grew during the renaissance and was mastered by Caravaggio, entails working with shadows and the contrast between light and dark that gives his paintings a sense of being three dimensional.

Björn would like us to write poetry that creates drama by focusing on the contrast between opposites, between light and dark, good and evil, thinking like Caravaggio. We have to make the light shine and lift from the shadows, not forgetting the drama. 

33 thoughts on “Subjugation”

  2. A powerful poem with a very moving sculpture Kim ~ I had goosebumps looking at the pictures ~

    This part really moved me:

    the Katyn Pieta kneels before
    the powerful wings and sword of the Angel of Death,
    cradling one of the fallen dead.

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  4. Incredible stark moving…this is so an amazing poem about yet another dark time in our human history. The last line, This monument cannot be misunderstood…is a slap in the face. No, intentional murder cannot be misunderstood.

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  7. Incredibly powerful poem, Kim. The visuals add to the pathos. A timely write considering what is happening in the world. And what happened in the past. I think of the calibrated terror of the two world wars. What happens next?

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    1. There seem to be reminders all over Wroclaw, statues, monuments and murals, which is a good thing. Young people need a nudge. There is even a building with bullet holes in it, left over from the war. I might write about that too.

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  12. I loved the poem, it brought home the darkness of war, any war. It reminded me of some of the WW1 poetry I read as a young woman, and also of the “hopelessness and loss”. It felt like a wound that cannot heal. Thankyou. Much Love.

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  14. So
    many
    evils
    of dArk
    hidden sTiLL
    as liGht too.. now..
    i’m alWays amazed
    when even a Roman
    Emperor can be lauded
    as Saint executing country
    side peasants named as heathens
    without
    A flavor vowed
    to A belief of the day..
    Apocalypse dArk
    Apocalypse liGht
    Original Definition
    oF term noW iN
    Greek way iS lifting
    veils of ignorance grey..
    one day to walk iN liFe without
    aggression.. violence.. and killing
    fields same.. liFe expresSinG best as liVinG
    naked
    without
    lies and
    hidden deceit
    iN clothes of status.. power..
    subjugation.. yes.. and control
    over ones seen and felt as different..
    from a norm in all the religious and
    cultural
    ways
    innate
    too as different sAMe..:)

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  15. The Soviets denied responsibility until 1990. Eastern Europe is filled with mass graves dating back thousands of years. Your poem is somber and filled the pain of a ruptured nation.

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    1. I think they tried to pass the buck to the Nazis at the time but, as ever, such things can’t be denied for long. I had seen pictures of the monument and knew about the background but it wasn’t until I stood walked up to it, around it and read the plaque that I felt the pain – I cried.

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