History Lesson First, one in the crowd puts the eye on you-- a nod to number two who gets the message and flips back something sidelong, something snide that everybody hears but you. Soon three or four are in it. They'll make sure you catch the steel glint of the snigger they wear like a badge. And there come five or six together, casual, shouldering in around you with a single grin and nothing you say seems to reach them at all. The badmouthings they call mean only this: they want to scratch. You are the itch. A thousand years stand by, hissing Witch! Nigger! Yid! All you hear is silence lumbered shut around you. And the ten or hundred looking on look on. They are learning not to see. The bell rings, too late. Already this is history.
History Lesson.
Gross, Philip
History Lesson First, one in the crowd puts the eye on you-- a nod to number two who gets the message and flips back something sidelong, something snide that everybody hears but you. Soon three or four are in it. They'll make sure you catch the steel glint of the snigger they wear like a badge. And there come five or six together, casual, shouldering in around you with a single grin and nothing you say seems to reach them at all. The badmouthings they call mean only this: they want to scratch. You are the itch. A thousand years stand by, hissing Witch! Nigger! Yid! All you hear is silence lumbered shut around you. And the ten or hundred looking on look on. They are learning not to see. The bell rings, too late. Already this is history.