New York City, June 14, 2016

★★★ Pigeons seethed around something unseen on the sidewalk in the shade. The shade was where to be; outside it, fierce precise daylight was hitting everything, shining through the little perforations in street-sign posts, flashing on glitter or confetti in the gutter that ought to have been too trampled and begrimed to flash. The smell of cut green wood came up a closed street where a tree-trimming truck was at work. In the shadows everything seemed perfect, even as on the opposite sidewalk people waiting in a line were trying to protect themselves with umbrellas as parasols.