Pulling the cloth cap from my head, I wearily turn on my radio and listen as the sounds fill the hollow room. Some people would call it elevator music, some would say it was for old timers such as myself. To me though, it represents a time I can not forget, though I've tried every night for the past 65 years to do just that.

'Fishing' he says, and I scoff. Why do I dislike it so? Perhaps it's because I would see the guard throw dynamite into the lake, and watched as the poor defenseless fish would rise to the surface stunned. Before they knew what was happening, they were rounded up and killed, like my family and friends. We couldn't protect ourselves any better than those fish.

I could hear the screams during the day, and the cries from those left behind in the night. Though I was only a young man, I learned quickly that those who went to the 'showers' were the lucky ones.

The ash as the bodies were carted off and burned covered most of the surfaces outside. Lucky were those who were new, and didn't realize what the fine film was.

I didn't mean to make them feel uncomfortable, and I knew when they saw my tattoo they were at a loss for words. I make a joke, and it gets a small smile from the men. The Mountie though, he understood. He knows the loss only death can bring. Death.... it and I are old friends. It is among the dead I feel safe.

Life I find interesting. I don't know why I survived. I do know that I will remember these past six decades and when my time comes, I will share it with my family.

I look at my arm with the tattoo and run a crooked finger across it. This is how they will recognize me when my time comes. This is why I've kept it all these years.

The clock tells me there is still two hours left before the work day is over, and I wearily go over to the next cadaver waiting for my 'expertise'. Pulling back the sheet, I begin to cut the clothes away.

The boy is young, no more than 16 or 17 and I shake my head. Another young life cut short. My hands still as a tattoo of a Nazi swastika comes into view.

I mutter a prayer and a plea, but not for the young man lying before me, no. For him it is too late.

'Why?' I ask God. 'Why after all this time, have we not learned anything?'

The End