New York City, April 26, 2016

★★★ One large piece of trash, then another, blew slowly by outside the 27th-floor window. Again the morning was cloudy and grimy-looking; this time it turned near clear by midday. Striking Verizon workers blew whistles, shrill on the breeze. The vestibule outside the fancy bakery had been taken down for the season. The temperature map on the phone was full of violently irreconcilable numbers, but nothing right outdoors seemed ominous. Things finally darkened, and headlights gleamed on the wet avenue. Then, without fuss, things brightened again. The cycle repeated, a little darker in the dark part, yielding to full light, and that was the extent of it all.