By Dayra Barona
The air feels calm, but it is not entirely peaceful. At the beginning of autumn—and every spring—it carries particles that look like tiny, woolly figures, harmless, expelled by trees and grass, announcing the arrival of a new season.
They say that to contemplate is to admire, and that it is a new way to reconnect: to watch the sky paint itself with white brushstrokes, a distant glimmer, almost imperceptible. The mixed scent of grass, the river, and distant traffic envelops everything.
Invisible allergens of autumn drift on the wind from the neighborhoods of Queens. Even from this peaceful corner of Astoria Park, where one can observe the contrast between industry and city life, the air, the wind, and the water seem clean… but they are not entirely what they appear to be.
Something is felt on the skin: a slight itch rising in the hands, tiny reddish bumps that flake—the things we call allergies. The air feels like a soft veil that irritates rather than comforts.
Weather reports on cell phones already show poor air quality, with high levels of pollution and health risks. I wonder: has breathing clean air become a luxury, something exclusive? The skin reacts, unsure whether the air is soothing or aggressive.
Here we are again, facing great Manhattan. The itch in the hands now spreads to the neck, and although the view still shows a fresh and light environment, it is the contrast that the body perceives. Now the eyes burn: what does the air report say? “Highly sensitive individuals,” it warns.
The New York City Department of Health reported 4,300 emergency room visits for asthma due to ozone, smog, and other pollutants that worsen conditions for this population, with Harlem and the Bronx reporting the highest hospitalization rates.
It is an autumn day—one of approximately 150 in New York each year when the monitoring system reports poor air quality. I wonder: is this the air we deserve to breathe? The industries, the cars, the dust, the impact on ecosystems… here we are, New Yorkers, living a life completely outside our natural habitat.
The view still shows how beautiful it could be, yet it conceals countless invisible pollutant particles in the air, leaving visible traces for everyone.
My imagination travels like a shooting star: what will it be like to breathe in the future? Today is 2025.
Dayra Barona is a Latina immigrant writer from Colombia, based in Astoria, Queens. Her work emerges from close attention to the body and its quiet reactions to the environment, itching skin, burning eyes, and the uneasy sensation of breathing air that appears clean but is not. Moving through the city as both witness and participant, she reflects on pollution, migration, and urban life as shared conditions of vulnerability.