Uncle Isidore

In the poem we get the impression that the persona is remembering his Uncle Isidore. In the first stanza the persona seems to 'observe' Uncle Isidore describing him as 'sprawled like Karl Marx' and also as being 'slumped, dead or asleep', which to me seems like the persona is remebering Uncle Isidore as he is no longer alive.

The persona says 'Before Auschwitz, Treblinka, he seemed near, those days of local pogroms, five year programmes' suggesting that like Abse, his uncle was also Jewish so may of experienced being in a German concentration camp. The last part of the stranza it seems that Uncle Isidore looked to God for guidance at this time of his life.