They were glad enough to see

so much thrown in the dustbin

when the Wall came down;

but not the Ampelmännchen

the traffic light’s little green man

with his jaunty, Erich Honecker hat.

 

At the threat of his deposal

by the west’s staid cousin

there was outcry. Now

Herr Everyman’s cheery gait

sets Berlin’s tone on carrier bags,

coffee mugs, T-shirts.

 

Beside the Reichstag and Brandenburg Gate

he doffs his hat respectfully

amid Germany’s blackened history,

offering normality even

as teenagers racket among

Holocaust memorial slabs.

 

The hat’s raised also to solemn

Marx and Engels, acknowledging

their good intentions. Shaded by trees,

the statues’ hands and feet still burnished

by Ostalgie and wishful thinking

as the city goes briskly about its business,

 

past filling stations where border posts

and watchtowers once stood.

He beckons: what’s that he’s saying?

Forget the barbed wire,

the places that sent you.

Your journey’s over. Willkommin.