“In the year of I Can’t Breathe, a hospital occurred on Randall’s Island. The building was fashioned, rather quaintly, of matter. Bricks, windows, smoke. The occasional human being stained the site, summoned from the holding pen. The hospital used flesh tradi- tionally — draped over the anguished little need machines we call people. Space was pushed through rooms, to keep them from collapsing, or so it seemed. In truth, no one understood how such a spectacle could remain stable. Religion and science broadcast a distant wisdom, no different from birdcalls, and actual birds policed a space the size of the whole world.”

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