dark car

Riding the D train this morning on my way into work, the car I'm on (#2711) is completely dark inside -- no emergency lights, no door indicators, nothing.

As we ride through the tunnels, the side lights scan over the passengers' faces like miniature lighthouse beacons, with intermittent red or blue highbeams from safety lamps and full squares of yellowish, dimmer light from the R train alongside.

Nobody talks on the dark car, or moves much except to work on a Blackberry or play a iPod. The little screens look like blue glowing patches of denim.

Between Pacific St. and the Manhattan Bridge the tunnel lights are fewer and the car grows darker yet. Each passing fluorescent tube casts individual starburst shadows on the ceiling of the train. Now the light from the adjacent cars is much more evident -- a window at each end of the dark car, people still in the real world.

The train angles down slightly, then climbs as we emerge onto the bridge. The sky's blue-white light flows from the front end of the car to the back like an ocean wave. Sleepers shift and rub their dark-adapted eyes.

Beautiful.