Unnamed Poems for Berlin

Graffiti city between train tracks

Shivers through Berlin.

One cannot walk absentmindedly

In a city that still aches of division.

History's horror now tourist traps

I had my passport stamped seven times today

But I can walk through walls now

I was born with the birth of reunification.

Marks left by those who could never leave

Remain still, between shopping malls

And train stations.

Safe train stations.

I feel so old but this city feels so young

We are the same age.

Narrow escapes across wide danger

What could they win with death strips?

I stand unsure on the edge of East and West.

The scar still fresh on this city reunited

How do people live in the shadow of this history?

Three days and I already feel oppressed

21 year old mirror of history and horros

We look each other in the eye

And grow older.

--10.30.11

Autumn is beautiful in Berlin

The ground becomes softer

Covered in golden leaves

But the city feels shrouded in death

Each moment sitting on a park bench

Another leaf falls.

I sit in the oldest Jewish cemetery in Berlin

The Nazis even ruined the dead

No one is allowed memories.

Even the old here is new, replicas

A false history to cover up a little of the real

Or to always remember

What was.

Berlin is inspiring,

I write.

But living here feels like dying

Crushed under the weight of history.

--10.31.11

The first day after the fall of the wall was November 10, 1989. Exactly 6 months before I was born.

The official reunification of Germany was October 3, 1990. Five months after I was born.

Berlin Portrait 11.1.11

(Also look at how much hair I have.)