Friday 24 July 2015

die stadt oder can't you smell that smell

From a Liverpudlian of renown (the smell would turn you too), I learnt of the lyrical farewell that Samuel Taylor Coleridge bid Kรถln, titled On My Joyful Departure from the Same City:

As I am a Rhymer,
And now at least a merry one,
Mr. Mum’s Rudesheimer And the church of St. Geryon
Are the two things alone
That deserve to be known In the body-and-soul-stinking town of Cologne.

I am far from sharing that sentiment and rather look forward to visiting again, but thought it a nice collection of lines nonetheless. Aside from the endorsement of the Basilica of Saint Gereon, one of the twelve ancient Romanesque churches of Kรถln, it’s interesting to think about how urban decampments might be remembered, bottled with a certain fragrance—which only one takes away with leaving them.