Light Observation!
22 April, 2012
Harlem, NY
Around 9:30 pm
En route to Penn Station on a double decker Megabus, I sit in the front of the second story with a full view of the entire road in front of us. We’re driving south through Harlem on a rainy night. With the height of the bus, my view is just below that of the street lamps and signals. The streets are shiny with the rain, reflecting the amber of the street lamps visible through the trees with dripping branches.
The streets are dark and shiny with the rain, and the little amber blotches disappear underneath the bus as we whiz through the Harlem streets, black with the night. The dark of the night and streets and rain want to encroach upon us, but we’re moving so fast that we leave it in the dust, speeding steadily towards the next light. We’re never caught in the dark for too long, it’s never too far until the next street lamp, and we’re getting closer and closer to the perpetual brightness of further downtown. Everything is fast and close the way a chase scene in a movie comes across, all breakneck and jerky with spastic movement. But we always catch up to the next patch of reflected street lamp, even if we can’t see it through the trees.