New York City, July 11, 2016

★★★★ Bright flies hopped on a dog turd on the sidewalk of 71st Street, a sidewalk strewn so thickly with dog turds it seemed to have been conscientiously done to prepare for the morning commute. The temperature was always on its way to being something else, edging between warmth and chill, the air alternately stale and fresh. Whatever it was, the air conditioning was the wrong solution. By afternoon the sunny side of the street was a refuge. The light came sideways and bluish, diffused through little puffs of cloud that were pressed together in rows, rows pressed together in a sheet. The sun got lower and lower till the cloud sheet was gray and the bits of cloud above and below it were white. The whole structure came apart then, into brilliant flakes or coins of silver and gold scattered across the west. They shone for a long time, fading slowly while the colors of light around them warped to orange and lemon and a final deep magenta.