Places 32: At Masada

Inside the jambling noise
of tourists and tour guides
a little group, in quiet,
slowly stepped aside.

They stood, in silence.
Then five strong sons of Abraham
moved as if one man.

Each hurled a stone high, high
each flew, as if with wings
five stones of earth
rose high into the distant blue.

Then a single sound broke through.
The voice, that started small,
began to swell. It grew and grew
as these five men,
cried, “Never Again.”

 

 

Note: Masada is a high plateau above the Dead Sea in Southern Israel. Today it’s  a tourist attraction. At one time, it was the site of Herod’s fortified palaces. After the fall of Jerusalem in 70 A.D., it was a occupied by almost a thousand Jewish Zealots who had fled there for protection. In 73-74 AD, a legion of Roman soldiers built a huge assault ramp. According to Josephus (but not substantiated by sound archeological evidence) before the Romans could  batter down the wall and enter the fortress, the defenders committed mass suicide. Only five children and two women survived. .

For many, the words I remembered and Never Again are synonymous with the Holocaust.

 

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