How the Word Is Passed: A Reckoning with the History of Slavery Across America

by Clint Smith

I have seen it happen to others, and it could happen to me. It could happen to you. It could happen to any of us. Time collapsed in on us. I saw my grandmother sitting in front of me become the little girl she once had been. I imagined her walking home along that north Florida road, her ankles lightly dusted by the dirt that spit out from under her shoes. Heat rising from the splintered red earth beneath her feet. Wildflowers lining the sides of the road, their stems leaning over to kiss the clay. I saw her, books in hand, trying to avoid the eyes of the children who targeted her. My grandmother, who only wanted books that did not have the pages torn out of them, who only wanted to be able to use the restroom in a bus station without being expected to relieve herself outside like a dog, who only wanted to walk through the world without being consumed with fear that she might be disappeared into the night. I imagined the faces of those white children on the bus, their mouths full of violence, their jaws contorted with callousness when their lips opened, their adolescent brows raised in anticipation of her quiet surrender. I imagined how the laughter must have cascaded among them. Their bellies full of malice. I imagined how their heads jettisoned themselves from the side of the bus, how their small arms clawed over half-opened windows just to throw food at my grandmother in a spectacle of cruelty. These children were not born to hate this way. They had been taught. They had...