Stanley Bulbach -

Nieuw Amsterdam — a prayer carpet

The 1610's were the decade in which the new Dutch colony at the tip of Manhattan flourished, giving New York City traditions and flavors that are still a major part of the city's unique character four centuries later.

The 1610's were also the decade when the tulip craze seized the Netherlands, and when financial speculation on tulip bulb became an uncontrollable boom followed by a catastrophic financial collapse.

In this piece one might sit among the New York's spring tulips, surrounded by ominous architecture, and contemplate the constricted view of the sky.