I’m standing a thousand feet above the streets of New York City, on the 86th floor observatory deck of the Empire State Building, looking for birds. It’s a few hours after sunset, and New York City naturalist Robert “Birding Bob” DeCandido is leading our small group. We can see the cityscape in every direction as the cool wind tousles our hair, but our gaze is focused up. Migrating songbirds, many of which travel by night to keep cool and avoid predators, are passing high overhead on their autumn journey. DeCandido has taught us how to differentiate the movement of small birds—“See how they flap-flap-glide?” he tells us—from the erratic motions of moths, But there is another denizen of the city’s skies that we’re all hoping to see.
A blur of a bird zips past the western flank of the building, level with the observatory. It’s too fast for a gull, too big for a songbird. Maybe a pigeon. Maybe something else. There is an excited buzz as we fumble with binoculars, unable to track the receding figure.
Meera – I think I’ve always cast a hopeful anthropomorphism at Peregrines, revealed in the titles “fastest animal takes New York” and such. To cut through the riddle of this enormous place – anyone who comes here who is vaguely like an artist has to be mindful of Malcolm X, or Andy Warhol, or Susan Sontag. What does it say about New York (and me) that I don’t have recent examples of the youthful deadly cultural invader? My politics has this answer: cultural falcons are out of category. Or they are so bold that they destroy and enlarge their native one. Who has recently laid waste Manhattan like Norman Mailer… Kara Walker? Stephen Colbert? Lady Gaga? Maybe our city’s culture has splintered too much for that old kind of feathery flash.