The beauty and the dark possibilities are still there. In the deep green of Stanton and Lincoln Parks in Northeast, pools of shadow are inked beneath the trees. On the western bank of the Anacostia River, the dock lights of the old marinas glow just south of the Sousa Bridge. From atop 13th at Clifton Street, downtown sprawls out, illuminated and landmarked with familiar monuments, from atop 13th at Clifton Street, the edge of the Piedmont plateau. Here a young man casually shows me the butt of his automatic, holstered in the waistband of his trousers, as he crosses in front of my car.
Deep night clears the city of the straight world, as other forms of human and animal life emerge.
Rats move freely over streets, dropping into sewer slats and scampering over dirt mounds piled at the edges of construction sights. Men shoot craps, their crouched silhouettes set against yellow-lit project stairwells and courtyards enshrouded in haze. Boys in their early teens, lookouts for drug runners, sit atop trash cans and mailboxes, their eyes both unemotional and alert. A prostitute smokes a cigarette in the doorway of furniture store on 7th above New York Avenue, blocks away from any potential Johns, her hotbox embers revealing a hard, almost masculine face. Jones haunt the all night CVS below Thomas Circle.