Galaxy

"Outside New York, a high place where with one glance you take in the houses where eight million human beings live.
The giant city over there is a long flimmery drift, a spiral galaxy seen from the side.
Inside the galaxy, coffee cups are being pushed across the desk, department store windows hold out a begging cup, a whirlwind of shoes that leave no trace behind."
Tomas Tranströmer, The Half-Finished Heaven

Wonder City

"New York is a wonder city, a veritable fairyland
With many sights not to be seen in Massachusetts or Maryland.
It is situated on the island of Manhattan
Which I prefer to such islands as Welfare or Staten.
And it is far superior
To the cities of the interior."
Ogden Nash, Many Long Years Ago

Delirium

Times Square (Credit: Frankie242 / FreeDigitalPhotos.net)

"Heartless, Godless, Hell's delight;
Rude by day and lewd by night;
Bedwarfed the man, o'ergrown the brute,
Ruled by boss and prostitute;
Purple-robed and pauper-clad,
Raving, rotting, money-mad;
A squirming herd in mammon's mesh,
A wilderness of human flesh;
Crazed with avarice, lust and rum,
New York, thy name's 'Delirium.'"
Byron Rufus Newton, "Owed to New York," in I Speak of the City

The Ways of New York

Peter Stuyvesant statue

"New York is of in four ways:
It is the New York of 1622, with the Indians around, and its shape then:
which it still has.
It is the New York of Peter Stuyvesant.
It is the New York of James J. Walker.
It is the New York or someone who came here from New Jersey this morning
and left this afternoon."
Eli Siegel, New York Is, In More Than One Way

Grand Central

Grand Central Terminal

"The city orbits around eight million
centers of the universe

and turns around the golden clock
at the still point of this place.

Lift up your eyes from the moving hive
and you will see time circling

under a vault of stars and know
just when and where you are."

Billy Collins, Grand Central