Only in Brooklyn: Guard Dogs on Rooftops

Guard dogs on rooftops follow your path
running along the ledge, barking nonstop.
I heard about someone in a nearby building
who threw a steak on the roof to shut the dog up
and for the rest of the night it was quiet.

Off Off the Beaten Track: Dutch Kills (Borderland Wonderland, Part 3)

The sectors of a city . . . are decipherable, but the personal meaning they have for us is incommunicable, as is the secrecy of private life in general, regarding which we possess nothing but pitiful documents.

—Guy Debord




The service road beside Newtown Creek, past the forking railroad tracks spanning Dutch Kills, looked ripe for exploration. The satellite photo was ambiguous, though; it looked like the only way onto the tracks was through a large truck depot, but was it accessible? Would the gatekeepers of industry bar my way?


Up from the subway



Onto the footbridge


Highway cash crop
Billboard harvest






Target acquired. Trespassing? I don’t know, but it felt like it.






On the rickety wooden footbridge between the forking railroad tracks. . . the rumbling and clanking of the scrap yards on the creek within earshot . . . I am ecstatic beneath the satellite photos that guided me here.







On Railroad Avenue I heard something rustling behind me and I turned quickly, thinking it a rat. It was a puppy from the scrap yard, a dusty little mutt, sweet as can be, rabidly frisky, nipping at my fingers—pure motion.



We had a moment together . . . Goodbye sweet little dusty scrap yard puppy.

Maspeth/Calvary Cemetery (Borderland Wonderland, Part 2)

Borderland wonderland
Edge of the cemetery
Industrial periphery



Crossing the bridge to Queens
A concrete factory on English Kills



The Crane District




Living in industry



It's a living


Full frontal ductwork


Bridge to the end


Exit R.I.P.


Buried under debt



Corporate headstone



Death of industry (smokestack tombstone)


The last pitch