There is something about
this song, there is some
thing about this song sung
live in Berlin, there is
something about this song
sung live to an audience
who maybe weren’t alive to
hear the beginning & yet they
all still remember how the
foretelling went. There is

something about this song
sung along to by an audience
who may not even be old
enough to see when what
was foretold came to pass.
There is something about
this song written in Berlin,
that was performed there
a year later, that may have
remained just another pop

song until it was Live Aided
into prominence. That, two
years after that concert, was
performed on a stage backed
up to the Berlin Wall so that
the audience on both sides
could hear it & then, two more
years on, remembered the song
as they attacked the Wall &
brought it tumbling down.

& some years after that, back
in Berlin, Bowie is brought to
tears when he realises the
audience he is performing in
front of is made up in equal
parts of those, the seen & un-
seen, who sang along with
him from both sides of the
wall & who added a new
chorus, “the wall must fall.”

Mark Young was born in Aotearoa, New Zealand, but now lives in a small town in North Queensland in Australia. His most recent book is the downloadable pdf, XXXX CENTONES, available from Sandy Press.

You can find more of Mark’s work here on Ink Pantry.