Gemini
The white man is very clever. He came quietly and peaceably with his religion. We were amused at his foolishness and allowed him to stay. Now he has won our brothers, and our clan can no longer act as one.
Chinua Achebe
The thing that was said and cannot be taken back has already begun its work in the room, even if the room pretends otherwise. You can see it in how the conversation moves around the empty place where the words were, how everyone suddenly knows what not to mention. What you said was true when you said it, and it is still true now, but the truth has become something different in the air between you and the person who heard it. The sentence lives in two places at once: in the moment you spoke it, and in every moment since. You cannot apologize it away because the problem was never that you said it wrong.