Skopp Creative Competition Winner Honors Her Late Grandfather

The Plainview, Long Island, native initially learned about the competition freshman year when Dr. Jonathan Slater, associate professor of communication, spoke about it at a meeting. Cohen said she wanted to participate before she graduated.

The competition's theme is significant to Cohen, who said she felt connected to the Holocaust as a member of the Jewish community.

"The Holocaust is an event that you always feel connected to," she said. "The atrocities of it were catastrophic and devastating to my culture."

Her submission portrays emotions felt by those who have lost a relative or loved one. She said the poem is specifically about her experience coping with the absence of her grandfather, George, who died before she was born.

She said her poem relates to the Holocaust because many families were left to grieve after their relatives perished during the genocide.

"There is that feeling of what could have been and what there no longer can be," she said. "We were robbed of our future, of memories that cannot be made."

As a nursing major, Cohen said that she had little experience with creative writing before completing her submission and described her drafting process as naturally flowing.

She said her use of repetition throughout the work allowed her to emphasize the poem's theme.

"There is such a beauty in poetry," she said. "It was a fun avenue to explore."

Skopp, distinguished university teaching professor of history emeritus and namesake of the competition, said he was moved by the poem and the sadness, sorrow, regret and remorse that it elicited.

"I was quite moved that Ms. Cohen captured her grandfather's presence so well in so few lines," he said. "I am sure that her grandfather would be proud of her — so very proud."

Skopp said the poem embodied the theme of the Holocaust in its realization "that we have all lost someone that would have loved us, would have taken great joy in our lives as only grandparents can."

"The Holocaust need not have happened," he said. "It was and still is an outrage. A monstrous outrage."

When notified of her achievement, Cohen said she was in awe and felt deeply honored to be selected. She said she had entered the competition not to win but to take part in the remembrance of the Holocaust. Her $250 prize will be used to pay for her nursing board exam.

"I learned that there are so many people who appreciate the work people put into honoring those lost in the Holocaust," she said. "People were thanking me for my submission. I was just happy to present my poem and do my part."

In her competition entry, Cohen wrote:

"The atrocities of the Holocaust have left many without grandparents, husbands and wives, mothers and fathers, sons and daughters; generations were wiped out, cutting family trees short and memories to never be made. This poem is in honor of my grandfather whom I never had the chance to meet, but also speaks for all the lives lost from this tragedy in history, all who have “a man they never knew.” Through the power of repetition, the message strongly conveyed in this poem is about what was taken—the memories of what could have been, the future. I was truly inspired by this concept and created a poem around the sensations that I have been robbed of. For that alone, I believe that this poem will resonate with those who have lost loved ones in the Holocaust and also trigger the image of what could have been if 'the man I never knew' was here today."

“The Man I Never Knew”
By Alice Cohen

The man I never knew

Was never here to see me for the first time

The man I never knew

Was never here to hear my voice

The man I never knew

Was never here to look me in the eye

The man I never knew

Was never here to see me grow up to who I am today

The only way I know this man

Is just through one picture

The only way I know this man

Is just from some stories I heard when I was young

The only way I know this man

Is from my mom’s telling

The only way I know that this man was great

Was from the tears that

dripped and dropped 

and splattered 

on his picture

The only way I know that this man was great

Was from the crying of my mom when his name was heard

This man was no ordinary man

For he was a special man;

A man who did great things 

with a great heart

And that great heart

That had thumped and thumped in his chest

Is gone

In my own heart I have saved a spot so significant

That without it saved inside of me

I would be smashed into a million pieces like a mirror

Broken and scattered into a million pieces on the floor

With no way to be picked up and put back together

The man I never knew

Was never here to see me for the first time

The man I never knew

Was never here to hear my voice

The man I never knew

Was never here to look me in the eye

The man I never knew

Was never here to see me grow up to who I am today

The man I never knew

Was my Grandpa George