Dear Rachel | Hannah

Dear Rachel,

I read your blogpost (click the link to read the blogpost) about the Memorial to the murdered Jews. I just wanted to say that I know how you feel. I know that feeling you described, when you see people being so disrespectful. I went there myself and I wrote a poem about it. It's about what I felt when I visited the memorial mixed with thoughts about a friend of mine feeling trapped and overwhelmed by life, and everything that was going on at the time. I remember feeling really lost and small walking into the memorial deeper and deeper. It was really intense. I visited the memorial at night. It being dark and lights around us from the Light Festival, it was a strange experience. I don't remember planning the trip. Maybe we came aross it by accident, maybe our teachers planned for us to see it. But it was strange and sad. Not everyone took it seriously. I feel very incapable of capturing what it means to the people actually hurt by what happeend during the war. A lot of the times, when I think about it, I feel like it is something incredibly distant, which it is, in some ways. I do feel the responsibility, especially when seeing a memorial like that, to make sure people know about this. It's just that sometimes, you can feel a little lost in your own world.. 

I don't know how your 'reading Dutch poetry' is, but I roughly translated it in to English, if you want to read it in English, too.

Ik stop niet

Berlijn 2012

Ik voel me gevangen
Gevangen in een droom
Omringd door stenen bomen
Ik voel
Glooiend bos landschap
Ik begeef me over heuvels
Maar ik vind mijn weg niet
Verdwaald
Verdwaald in een droom
Waar ik de weg niet meer vind
De weg kwijt in mijn eigen land
Mijn eigen stad
Ik voel me gevangen
In een droom die werkelijkheid lijkt
Maar de kloof is er
Voelbaar
Tussen de dromen en de werkelijkheid
Maar ik stop niet
Ik zoek een uitweg
Gevangen in een droom
Maar ik stop niet

Voor M.

©HannahvanDijk

Translation

I won't stop

Berlin 2012

I feel trapped
Captured, like in a dream
Surrounded by concrete trees

I feel

Flowing forest landscape

I find myself moving

But I can't find my way

Lost

Lost, like in a dream

I can't find my way, anymore

Lost in my own country

My own city

I feel trapped

In a dream that seems reality

But the chasm is there

Tangible

Between dreams and reality

But I won't stop

I will find a way out

Captured, like in a dream

But I won't stop

To M.

©HannahvanDijk

Less than three,

A teacher to be,

Hannah