Greenwald's poem reads like a quick walk through a busy day, told in short, unpunctuated bursts. It opens with a jolt: a picture seems to shove the speaker aside, and the coat flaps in the wind. The speaker "picks up" himself from a "bunch of snaps," as if he were one photograph among many, then simply moves on. Traffic is thick, the day is dry, and nothing dramatic happens.
The mood is casual, watchful, and a little dreamy. Without punctuation, one moment slides into the next, so the poem feels like attention wandering from street to room. The tune that seems to come from "a lot of places" is a good example: sound has lost its source, and the speaker calls it "funny" without seeming troubled. The ending lifts the poem a little. Being "on one of the waves / Opening the water" suggests the speaker is carried along, part of a movement larger than himself, and fairly content to be.