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July 21, 2014

Berlin (I Thought Of You)

Overshadowed by the streamlined buildings in Berlin, I thought of you. Of the Dunhill cigarettes you didn't smoke in our house. Of the pirate adventure stories you used to tell me as a kid, which only instilled in me this strong desire to see, to live, to just be; this idle impulse to be a pirate and a captain, of my own made up ship.

I thought of you when I was in Berlin, not because Berlin reminded me of you, but because it didn't, and it should have. So I thought of you. Of the way you used to comb your moustache with your right index finger, and then keep on talking as if combing anything with a finger is the most normal thing in the world to do.

I thought of you, on a day where reality was mistaken for a memory, and funerals were replaced by carnivals, on a day where seeing you meant that you were still here, still pretending that I wasn't your favourite, when you and I both know that I was, not because I was better, but because I was your first.

I thought of you, when I was waiting for the Ampelmann to turn red, and then green, and then again alongside the psychedelic part of the Berlin Wall. I thought of you, of the way you undefined love, almost as if it was a concentrated solution you just needed to dilute but didn't know how.

I thought of you, when I couldn't think of anything else, when the metallic lump in my throat came back and I started to question the fertility of my illusive imagination. I thought of you, somewhere in between here and there, somewhere in between then and now.

I thought of you. Overshadowed by the streamlined buildings in Berlin, I thought of you. And of the Dunhill cigarettes you didn't smoke in our house.