New York City, April 15, 2013

★★★★ The spots on the starlings were starry, for once, under the white noon, as they pecked on a not-quite-established patch of grass in the garden. In the crosswalks of Midtown, the people-to-vehicles ratio was unfavorable to getting anywhere by taxi. People ate at sidewalk tables with their coats on, in the mirrored light. The white had turned blue, with the pale crescent moon straight overhead in midafternoon. The breeze was changeable but never too heavy; the blooming trees now dappled the sunlight. Clouds rippled, then arrayed themselves in long parallel rows. The sunset light off buildings uptown was lurid enough to interrupt dinner, for a look at the still-more-lurid west.