The Algae Keepers

On the highest roofs, trays of water breathe and hum, not vines but living glass, a slow green speech. We tend them before dawn, hands smelling of salt and copper, listening to the sun arrive by increments.

The city below is a held note of buses and steam, its windows blinking like a patient constellation. Above, the algae thicken, sipping photons, turning brightness into a denser, darker music.

We skim the surface film, a velvet skin of summer, and pour it into drums with the hush of tidepools. There is a tenderness in this industry, a quiet faith in what can be grown from air.

By noon the panels mirror clouds as if rehearsing weather, and the birds circle, curious, over our fluorescent ponds. We go down the stairwells with green on our sleeves, carrying the day like a lantern fed by water.