Noctalgia

I remember nights like other lives, coming off a dance floor in a sweat and then the shock of cool dark. I’ve never loved New York more than in the dark, all those electric hearts beating, buildings with lit-up rooms and the rest like knocked-out teeth. 

New York was once the city that never sleeps. Now restaurants drop their grates well before midnight. The law still says that bars can let alcohol flow until 4 a.m., but they don’t, whether to be good neighbors or because their patrons are just too tired. Twenty-four-hour coffee shops and diners are dying. The lights are on but everybody’s home, in bed.

Some of our minds bloom only after sundown, like those flowers that hold themselves in until the day plants close their petals.