And when I type Holocaust on my phone,

The first recommended word

Is “denier.”

Holocaust denier.

And I wonder, how could someone deny this?

But really, I’m too late to ask that,

Decades too late, because

Even when people’s backyards were filled with

Screams and

Ashes and

Bloodstains, the kind that last generations, and

Bodies, bodies, come burn the bodies —

They looked the other way.

“Come to us,” they said, “you’re safe with us.”

And then the Polish

Murdered hundreds of people “safe with them.”

The British gave away possessions to the Nazis,

The French worked with the Gestapo.

Americans. Even you — yes, even you — aren’t blameless —

Your boys went off to fight, and your men —

Well, your men marched merrily under Swastikas and

Turned away those seeking refuge

(An all-too-common pattern in this nation of immigrants).

And in Germany?

With their backyard boneyards and

Neighborhoods of slaughterhouses?

You hear hopeful stories of

Brave woman who hid Jews, or

German family that helped Jews escape

But when a massacre happens

Right under the nose of a nation

You realize that fingers are easier to point than you’d think.

This is the hospital where my great-grandmother was murdered.

This is the pit my two-day-old uncle’s body was tossed into.

This is the train my grandfather almost died on,

These are the homes of the children who threw rotten onions,

This is where my great-grandfathers died for a nation that wanted them dead anyway,

This is, this is, this is…

This is where I point the blame.

Yes, there was a man named Adolf,

Yes, there was a book called Mein Kampf,

A poor country,

A lost war.

But there were people, too,

People not wearing Nazi black and green,

People who watched people murdered and said nothing

Because their skin wasn’t light enough or

They spoke the wrong language or

They worshipped the wrong G-d or

They loved the wrong person or

They were other, they were else, they weren’t

You.

So to the people who still, after all this time,

Refuse to hold up their heads and see:

This, all of it, is your

Legacy.

This, all of it, has become

Mine.

And how can you deny a legacy?