First of all, they came to take the gypsies

and I was happy because they pilfered.

Then they came to take the Jews and I said nothing,

because they were unpleasant to me.

Then they came to take homosexuals,

and I was relieved, because they were annoying me.

Then they came to take the Communists,

and I said nothing because I was not a Communist.

One day they came to take me,

and there was nobody left to protest.

Bertold Brecht, inspired by Emil Gustav Friedrich Martin Niemoller

The predominant verb tense in the poem is: