If one would ask how the monumental can be tender, October in New York City is still the answer. The city then recalls us to the brutal and to the awesome. Her wood and asphalt and brick skin becomes luminous in any pale light ~ it also reflects the shadow of the rock: New York in such shadow on a sunny day, the glass of her eyes has the blue of the sea. Days and nights slow down, people seem readier to recognize others, before the Transfiguration of Christmas.
New York October, when the magnificent blue sky glows like sapphire, after the sun sets. Streams and ponds and lakes of water flash blue. Great lines of silver-grey poplars rise and make avenues ~ or airy grey quadrangles ~ across the Park, their top boughs spangled with gold-and-green leaf. Sometimes gold-and-red, a patterning. A bigness ~ and nothing to restrain the romantic spirit. . .
