I sit at a bus bench on Sunday, the schedule’s slowest day. Waiting, I count signs: the sushi place, the dry cleaner, the liquor store, the gas station. Thirty-five signs. I count again. This time I get forty-two.

A nearly empty bus pulls over. The driver says something to dispatch. The half-dozen passengers thumb their screens. I do the figures: a thousand signs between here and home. Across the city, millions. One day after creation and we have named the world. So be it.

Bio: Tom Laichas