A Triolet
She served as doctor in the War Parents, young brother in Ukraine Close-knit, her family of four She served as doctor in the War No one survived from her Before Her soul was crippled by the pain She served as doctor in the War Parents, young brother in Ukraine
d’Verse poetics: Grandmothers
This triolet is about my father’s mother, whom I only met as a preteen, after the USSR started falling apart in the late eighties. She was permanently traumatized by the Nazi’s total liquidation of her shtetl, including her parents and little brother, which she discovered upon returning home at the end of World War II.
I wrote it for today’s d’Verse prompt, which is to pen a grandmother-themed poem.
Triolet?
A Triolet is a poetic form consisting of only 8 lines. Within a Triolet, the 1st, 4th, and 7th lines repeat, and the 2nd and 8th lines do as well. The rhyme scheme is simple: ABaAabAB, capital letters representing the repeated lines.
Make writing a Triolet more challenging! Make each line 8 syllables in length (4 metrical feet), written in iambic tetrameter (the more common way), or try it in pentameter (English version) where each line only has 10 syllables (5 metrical feet).
Let’s write poetry together!
When it comes to partnership, some humans can make their lives alone – it’s possible. But creatively, it’s more like painting: you can’t just use the same colours in every painting. It’s just not an option. You can’t take the same photograph every time and live with art forms with no differences.
–Ben Harper (b. 1969)
Would you like to create poetry with me and have a completed poem of yours featured here at the Skeptic’s Kaddish? I am very excited to have launched the ‘Poetry Partners’ initiative and am looking forward to meeting and creating with you… Check it out!
The Skeptic's Kaddish ๐ฎ๐ฑ 
How I feel for her, and your family. The trauma of surviving so much pain is extreme. Peoples’ stories never fail to amaze me. Yours would make a book, or a movie. So sad for what she went through.
๐๐๐ป Sherry ๐๐ป๐ ~ my grandparents served together in WWII…
Stripped to the essence, this cuts deeper for its simplicity. (K)
๐๐๐ป Kerfe ๐๐ป๐
Still so many alive to tell! Tatoos glorious tatoos escaped the ovens of a maniacle man!
๐๐๐ป Andrew ๐๐ป๐ ~ sadly, not so many remain to tell
There was a Catholic Woman I knew, I forget where she had been, in one of the camps Tattooed. Her husband sent to work on the railways transporting Jewish victims and the rest dead.
From here: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Identification_of_inmates_in_German_concentration_camps
Thanks David
So sad David. Very moving.
๐๐๐ป Rob ๐๐ป๐
This is a heartbreaking tribute.
I am quite a few decades closer to the War than you are, David, so I take it very personally. Half of my family perished in Babi Yar. One of my grandfathers is a survivor of Warsaw ghetto, and the other one went all the way to Berlin with the hospital where he was serving. You can imagine the stories I heard as a child.
๐๐๐ป Dolly ๐๐ป๐ ~ I can barely imagine the horror of any of the stories I have heard
To this day, I cannot bring myself to look at the photos, lest I have nightmares for weeks afterwards.
๐จ
Wow. Triolets are such an artificial form, and yet you make something so fresh and poignant here. “no one survived from her Before.” Just wow.
๐๐๐ป Sarah ๐๐ป๐ ~ in many ways, there wasn’t a lot more to say about her. She was never fully present.
Heartbreaking
๐๐๐ป Beth ๐๐ป๐
Wow!! That really packs a punch David and is loaded with meaning! Grandmothers have a history and toughness all of their own!
๐๐๐ป Ken ๐๐ป๐ ~ indeed
Heartbreaking ๐
๐๐๐ป Paula ๐๐ป๐
A sad truth about your grandma shared in brilliant form David.๐ข
๐๐๐ป Cindy ๐๐ป๐ ~ thanks
You’re welcome David! ๐
“No one survived from her Before”
All the meaning behind that. It just guts me, David.
๐๐๐ป Merril ๐๐ป๐ ~ me too
If my grandparents or great grandparents hadn’t left when they did . . .
David, your grandmother’s story touches my heart. So much pain and sorrow. โค๏ธ
๐๐๐ป Colleen ๐๐ป๐ ~ yes ๐ข
โค๏ธโ๐ฉน