The Face of a God

The fountain at Grand Army Plaza geysers water high into the air despite the gray, overcast, misty day. I walk past it from the arch at the top of Prospect Park towards Flatbush and the bust of JFK that they put up the year he died.

The fountain is a weird modernist/classic hybrid behemoth, all greenish brass and gods cavorting in water, that reminds me of the uber-pagan stuff they have at Rockefeller Center. Especially the Neptune they’ve got facing the park: he’s fat, but he’s somehow still got a six-pack, and his face is a rictus of awful good cheer that I find myself imagining providing small children nightmares for many past generations, and for many generations to come.