A tumult of wonders

O, multi-colored, multiform,
Beloved beauty over me....
--Edna St. Vincent Millay.

Today I went downtown for the first time in two months, and I am as dazzled by all that life as I was by the forest yesterday. The sounds, the smells, the ways people costume themselves: a thrill to my senses. I saw a young woman in a tailored suit with a bright red cloche hat laughing with a girlfriend also well-dressed, her silk scarf blowing in the breeze. I saw men in suits and men in security guard uniforms talking on cell phones, people of every size in lumpy hoodies and baggy jeans. I gazed at the sidewalk where leather boots and high-heeled shoes clacked aggressively against concrete. I stuck my head in Macy's and breathed in the expensive fragrance of cosmetics. I strolled through J. Jill and touched cashmere and angora, drank in colors with my eyes. I passed a group of ragged teenagers high on meth, picking at scabs on their faces and stinking of cigarettes and urine. I saw a man walking a smiling beagle, the dog's tail high, wagging with simple joy. I saw a woman in many layers of dirt-stained clothes pushing a shopping cart full of garbage bags, gesticulating and conversing with people she imagines. I saw a pre-school on an outing, some twenty adorable children strung together with ropes attached to one of five or six teachers or chaperones. Everywhere I saw life, color, people going somewhere with intention and a sense of importance. I realized how long this illness has lasted, how long I have been sequestered and deprived. Now every new thing is a tumult of wonders. This must be how it is to be released from prison after a long sentence. Faces. Shapes. Colors. Sounds. All this life. Even the construction sites, boarded up, are bright with life.

P.S. Added later. After some research, I discovered that the mural was commissioned by the company that has delayed--till 2015--its plans to erect a huge new building. They commissioned "two artists and New Avenues for Youth," an organization that serves homeless kids. How wonderful.