There is something about the way sounds sink during autumn. The air huddles around the branches, under the streetlights it clings to them like a determined halo. The world slows down. A half-closed eyelid it drags on, horizontally. Often it seems as if the whole planet, this spherical mass of yellow-leafed asphalt that we step over, as if it is simply talking to itself. Whispering under its’ own breath. As if each building, each turned-off headlight, each curtain lit from within, is simply trying to understand itself, whispering.. whispering…

There is a way sounds sink during autumn. In the park, someone’s dog broke loose, it took off suddenly chasing an unknown and an unseen through the fields, the owner does not see it, the owner launches a scream and then another. But we’re underwater now. The sounds fly one-fourth of the distance and head vertically into silence.

In the park is where silence begins to exercise. This is its training season, after all. It begins without fanfare, modestly. It begins stretching in the daytime shadows, it pulls itself up between the leaves, in the evenings slides between the plates, curls up in the space between the bulb and the lamp, between the mouth and the throat, it rests, it braids its hair, it unbraids it. There is never any rush.

Along the avenue, people fight back. It is an interesting hobby to observe. Suppliers of warmth extend their hours. Couches are set up in circles. Laptops are opened, earphones plugged. Tea lounges become airport terminals. Below them, the basement cellars become filled with the sound of a bass, the jingle of a guitar, the unmistakable scent of pilsner and dishwashing detergent.

Within the city, the worker ants group squadron-like by the subway entrances. Umbrellas are checked, unwound, readied. Hoods are unflapped. Nothing is left to chance.

They charge. Objectives are the new key. Noise is God. Silence is a class enemy. Their sounds razor through the morning lull.

Above them, modestly, Seurat draws his portrait next to an infinite staircase. He was always a master of silence. Wyeth as well. How genius, I think suddenly, it is to paint silence. How rare.

Above me a second-story window is unexpectedly jerked open, a head is produced. It gives the air a quick haaah and an oooooph, watches it turn grey and disappears.

Everything stays pretty quiet after that.