2016-11-22

Holocaust Haiku

Artwork: Käthe  Kollwitz

prátaí dubha
croíthe dubha
Cótaí Dearga ag máirseáil gach áit
black potatoes
black hearts
Redcoats everywhere on the march

A haiku in memory of the Irish Genocide (known as the Great Hunger) during which food was exported from Ireland under the supervision of 67 British Regiments.
Centuries earlier, the colonial poet Edmund Spenser recommended that the savage Irish be starved into submission and their language eradicated:
"So that the speech being Irish, the heart must needs be Irish; for out of the abundance of the heart, the tongue speaketh".