The singer Dan Bodan wrote an ode to Berlins Görlitzer Park
I’m sitting in the crater in Görlitzer park, on the ruins of the underpass that once would have connected the different "gleis" of the the bahnhof that apparently once stood here. A girl is walking along the bike path that traverses the length of the crater wearing green tights, an all black mini-kilt, a black and same-green leopard pattern wool sweater, black and same-green hair and accessories dangling from anything that will allow a chain or pin. She's doing that walk that pretty much everyone in this park used to do: feet first, hips forwards, shoulders back, jacket in one hand, beer in the other, not going anywhere specifically but definitely is gonna meet someone when they get there, and they're definitely going to do speed. she's stopped mid-way by the string from a home-made kite flown by a guy in a sideways cap and jeans rolled just below his calves, in a faded navy nondescript zip-up hoodie. She limbos under it and now i'm watching this punk manipulate his yellow and black aircraft in the breeze that's getting chillier as the sun sets. It's now almost 50meters above all of us reclining in the crater, and he's dancing with it like some kind of sexy anarchist tango instructor, complete with a nasty smell and dick piercing. I've decided that if, god willing, the kite falls on me and i need to return it to him I'll let him fuck me behind the petting zoo.
The sun's gotten low enough now that the park lights have turned on. Those didn't use to be here. ironically they make the park scarier somehow, but i'm typing on my laptop and I'm wearing a new jacket make of some kinda tech material, so i'm probably just projecting. looking across the other side of the crater at the parallel ruins, i notice they've boarded up with metal sheet the entrance to the tunnel that once was cut off only by prison style bars, allowing you to shout shit into a great echo chamber beyond. wish i could still do that… kinda. wish there was a still a 1 second delay. Things have sped up. and when i shout it's immediately in my ears now. and in yours. i'm clearer, cleaner, more precise. My voice is lower and I kinda have a mission now. but i still wonder where that black and same-green girl is going and if I could go with her. And would i meet a 21year old me there and would we get along.
I'm looking at that big metal M sculpture at the top of the crater, remember wondering when I was 21 if it was a reference to Fritz Langs 'M'. I'll be 30 in july. This is the longest i've lived in one city at one time in my life. suns gone now, but the frizbee players are still playing because frizbees have LEDs now. Ha, a dog in an LED collar just caught the LED frizbee.
On headphones I'm listening to a beat made by a friend, sitting on a ruin, in a crater, in a park watching LED dogs dance with LED frizbees. If i have a family, i'll want to raise them here. You've saved my life more than a billion times Berlin, and I love you.
Dan Bodan
Dan Bodan LIVE and TONIGHT:
May 7
10 pm
@ mumok, Vienna