Yad Vashem: Written in Pencil in the Sealed Freightcar

Dan Pagis experienced the horrors of the Holocaust as a young child and only addresses the trauma he experienced through poetry. In the poem "Written in Pencil in a Sealed Freightcar" he uses Genesis and the murder of Abel by Cain as a metaphor for the tragedy. There are multiple themes in this poem and a PDF is included that dissects each theme. Teachers can choose to teach all the themes or just some of them. Background information is given for each theme.