The following is a prose poetry narrative inspired by both Purity Ring‘s debut album, Shrines, and a trip I took to Berlin’s infamous electronic music nightclub, Berghain.
It seemed apt for Berlin that Berghain was more or less in the middle of the city, yet in the middle of nowhere. The labyrinth of residential streets and parking lots were occasionally splattered with graffiti, as if indicating the way. Spotted by the likes of the silently laughing Mein Lieber Prost face or a number from Mr. Six or the serendipitously appropriate Escape white rabbit outlined in thick bubbled red; art that would glow for the right eyes, reaffirming that, no, I was not lost. The buildings and paved streets faded away so that grass and dirt and puddles and trees could sprout into a junkyard wasteland. Stumpy and towering forms of either garbage or art sprung out of the ground, not asking the passerby to decide which was which.
