Grammatical New York (It's probably just Symbolic)

Before I came to the city, it was a quote.

The New Yorker would say,

The Times would say,

Bruce Vilanch would say... "New York."

But it was really just a high tilde. I knew it was on the keyboard, but I had no use for it.

When I arrived, the Taxi Driver with his mohawk and song of redemption only gave me an ellipsis...

I was begging for something more.

Was I left with anything more than questions?

I travelled ^Up and was met with FLASHES! and CELEBRITIES!

Exclamations and slurs [in brackets, for context].

I kept moving around the city, in tiny expanding circles. .oO

finding the $money tied to the percent of stock% quotes and digit@l interaction.

But my classes were telling me to be a CAPITAList & have more than one identity/understanding\of the world. I can be more than one thing.

I = so many things, but where am I? Do I need to be here?

Why is there so #much death. and focused melancholy if this place is the end-all, beat-all?

Where do I go from here?

Is this place a period.

No, I can leave.

sometimes it's a comma or a semicolon.

A pause is domestic, so that's LaGuardia,

but a harder pause is international, so that's JFK;

I'm still not excited, though. As if the Giants and Yankees fans were saying with a big colon: New York. That's the answer. That's the example, por ejemplo.

I'm +ing all of this up, I'm taking it in from an m — to an n – to a -

But, I believe now that I understand this place.

this place is an asterisk. (*You do what you want with it.)