It was a bit cooler today. A very fine mist of water seemed to fall onto the city in incredible slowmotion. What would have been unbearable humidity in the summer months, now, cool, appeared like the exactly right thing to happen. It is fall, after all. The leaves are moving from the branches onto the grass, onto the pavement, onto the streets. Their colors are now so much more vibrant, surprising, shouting. The colors are as saturated as the bright colors used by humans to announce most special events.
I left the subway on 50th Street at around 9:30. There were masses of people in the street, rushing. We were in the center of midtown after all. This is the place where a high percentage of the thinking actually makes it to the presses, to the billboards, back onto the street, back into the heads of those who were here with me, and far far beyond...
There was a very fragile little object, right by the yellow strip painted onto the sidewalk to mark the entrance to a parking garage.
It was a wing of a bird, maybe a sparrow, ripped out at the socket, right there, with the leaves, itself like a leaf. So perfect... so frighteningly beautiful
I managed to not imagine the story of how it got there and what happened to the rest of the certainly small animal... I tried to imagine that whatever happened here was painless and quick and unexpected.
Now this wing felt like the most peaceful little piece of the city. And yet bold powerful... just arrived at the end of its story.
Just fallen... for now... it was that time of year...
Icarus was still high above us, probably, holding back his tears...