ISSN: 1941-4137
POETRY THAT ENACTS THE ARTISTIC AND CREATIVE PURITY OF GLASS
POETRY THAT ENACTS THE ARTISTIC AND CREATIVE PURITY OF GLASS
Erin Murphy’s eighth book of poems, a collection of documentary poetry focusing on labor and employment issues, is forthcoming from Salmon Poetry in 2021. Her work has appeared or is forthcoming in such journals as The Georgia Review, The Normal School, Field, Southern Humanities Review, North American Review, Southern Indiana Review, and Women’s Studies Quarterly. Her poem "Debriefing: A Poem in Parts" won The Normal School Poetry Prize judged by Nick Flynn. She is editor of three anthologies from the University of Nebraska Press and SUNY Press and serves as Poetry Editor of The Summerset Review. She is Professor of English and Creative Writing at Penn State Altoona.
Poets Resist
Edited by Samantha Duncan
March 29, 2019
Edited by Samantha Duncan
March 29, 2019
Schuhläufer
Germany’s second-richest family built its multibillion-dollar fortune with Krispy Kreme Doughnuts, Jimmy Choo shoes and Calvin Klein perfume — and forced laborers under the Nazis.
— New York Times, March 25, 2019
The manufacturers of the shoes tested paid the SS a fee for the 'use of prisoners.'
— Sachsenhausen Concentration Camp, Oranienburg, Germany
How long will a pair of shoes last?
Days, weeks, months? The testers run
twenty-five miles a day around the track
in shoes and boots two sizes too small,
rain and wind pelting their faces and backs.
Stumble once and they are cracked
on the head with a stick. Twice and they
are loaded down with sand-filled sacks.
There are tricks to making time pass.
One man counts backwards — hundert,
neunundneunzig, achtundneunzig —
until his leg muscles go slack. Another
pictures his wife sitting on the banks
of the Spree, her black hair tucked under
a straw hat. Months, weeks, days, hours:
how long, how long will they last?
The poem connects with the recent news that the second-wealthiest family in Germany (of Krispy Kreme, Jimmy Choo shoes, and Calvin Klein) built its empire in part on forced labor under the Nazis. According to a March 25 New York Times article, "Albert Reimann Sr. and his son Albert Reimann Jr., who ran the company in the 1930s and 1940s, were enthusiastic Hitler supporters and anti-Semites, who condoned the abuse of forced laborers, not only in their industrial chemicals company in southern Germany, but also in their own home."
Poets Resist is published by Glass Poetry Press.
All contents © the author.
All contents © the author.
