EMERGING FROM THE subway I joined the crowds of Lower Manhattan, anxious about my first day on the job. The older buildings of the financial district were squat, tarnished sandstones puckered with sooty recessed windows. I walked towards a sense of openness and, turning a corner, saw the World Trade Center towers rising before me.

Like pewter-skinned jewels, the twin towers sipped sunlight from the source, illuminating all of Wall Street, both a beacon and a boast. The North Tower held aloft antennae which slipped under the sheath of firmament, like a hypodermic needle, poking bubbles of Babel into the stratosphere. The steel columns channelled gusts of wind and I imagined cloud particles swirling in the dust around me.