berlin and her fierce citizens birthed the Love Parade in 1989, she brought down the iron curtain, summoned the power of civil disobedience. countless bodies acting-working together. and then capitalism arrived, sniffing out the open space. arrived to chomp on the warm body of this city. not dead. doesn’t matter to the vultures. chomp chomp chomp. development, progress, profit. the capitalist way. well trodden. a single path, ever wider. stomping down life at its edges. stomp stomp stomp out any way of being, not conforming to its digestive track. in 2006 the Love Parade was uprooted from her body. pulled out, a weed, annoyance, inconvenience, chucked to the side, to die. in 2010, 21 humans in Duisburg did. stomp stomp stomp. shoes bloodied. walls standing doing perfectly well what walls do, containing, controlling, holding tall and strong against bodies.
2019. Zug der Liebe. train of love dedicated to tolerance and social engagement, street parade offering a day, a space for dancing, together, peacefully. 2018. 13.5 million visitors to this city sold as poor but sexy. sold as ready to cater to all your vices, cheaply, easily, endlessly.
Zug der Liebe, on your posters in bright orange, you shouted at us to come, a train was forming, cars linking up, a day, a space in-on-through the streets of berlin, for tolerance, social engagement, dancing. three days later i understand Zug der Liebe was indeed not shouting about a safer space. it could not. this train was a free ride. it was a blowing whistle summoning those who were listening.
now i understand, three days later, just how many people were not listening. after i took the journey. now i know the numbers. three days ago i had set out with optimism and with my chosen implements. my oiled-stretched-sculpted body, my mantle, my freshly painted patch proclaiming
FCK HATE
TiME FoR
SOLiDARiTY
cut hair, hairy legs and armpits and kunt, vegan boots eager to stomp, and water. all on the outside and in me, a choice-commitment-trust in solidarity. with this i climbed down from my home and entered public space, to honor my privilege to be able to do the together-strong-peace-dance, openly. free.
i approached from the south. got lost between canals filled with water and canals filled with flowers. got lost as i began to hear the beat wandering toward me. bouncing-playing off cement and tiled facades, summoning me. i locked and left my bike and began to skip with the multi faceted throbbing-peace-beat. many trucks blasting courageously. hard to dance to, but this was my first challenge upsi! time to learn and grow! i skip and run my body listening-feeling-keeping up. i catch up to the end of the train. a caboose of orange, picking up garbage, cleaning up the streets of the remnants of a journey. and bodies hot and sitting, stopping, exhausted. upsi has arrived for the second half of the journey. i pick up the slack. joyfully fold my energy into the mass and only now smell the fumes. alcohol. had been consumed. was consuming many bodies on this journey.
three days later, today, i dance and i stretch and i turn upsidedown before i can summon the courage, before i can make the choice to sit back down and share. my experience. share my shame. what a shame that a day, a way, a gathering celebrating peace and love and solidarity, was saturated with consumption. consumption fueling othering, irresponsibility, disrespect, assault, violence. and as i write this, i remember, my patch painted with the words, FCK HATE. an action. i remember, that i knew i would have to fight, that this was indeed a journey not yet the destination. i knew i had given my body for solidarity, had repeated to myself, had committed
my body my pleasure my tool
my tool was sharped on the train of love. was sharped as a stranger’s hand ran down and up me, tit to kunt, a strangers hand, i look up, a hand attached to a body that in more ways then not looks like me, a body and now i see the eyes red and wandering lost in the poison dream, i smell the ferment. 131 days sober and this alcoholic was molested, was thrust upon the baton of fear-hate-addition, invited to pass on the violence. NO. i came to dance the together-strong-peace-dance. i CHOOSE to look to the other stomping feet listen to the throbbing beat look up and see a translucent white flag which waves atop ostkreuz, berlin beyond it welcomes me to the end of this journey and invites me to continue on toward the destination. solidarity.