Bombay would be...

Do cities also have desires and ambitions?
A sense of destiny, dreams troubled by visions?
Does a city say, when I grow up,
I will be so gross, that people will want to throw up
(kolkata)

A city that feels that discipline is all that the world needs
A straight jacket to fit all human greeds
For licentiousness too a license
Rules! Yes rules! whether or not they make sense
Walk the line
Else pay the fine
(Singapore)

Pining for the unrequited love of that imagined beauty divine
Chewing on words
And spitting out verse
the colour of heartbreak and wine
Does a city want nothing but a poet’s life
Never mind the spit marks, and the querulous wife
(lucknow)

ever ready with a clap-on-the-back or a slap-on-the-face
wearing idiocy without disgrace
swinging between “Saale ke do thappad maar”
and “Kee farak painda hai yaar”
a loud guffaw
an eternal faux pas
The democracy of fun, food and boisterous..err....sex…ahem..
the world laughing with them, for them, and at them
A city that will grow up to be a joker,
And so absolutely hopeless at poker
(chandigarh, punjab)

An elegant, extravagant beauty
Loved and hurt
Desired and burnt
A smile trampled to bits
Lovely, long, wet, downcast lashes
As little men fight over the ashes
Of this burning phoenix

Free from being coveted…Free from being owned…..FREE!!!!
A beautiful lady who just wants to be.
Queenhood she doesn’t want,
she pines not for a king’s stares
Her dream, is simply
to be free of nightmares
(Srinagar, Kashmir)

Does a city want to grow up to be a historian (Delh)
Or just a coarse mouthed ruffian (Haryana)
A delighter of senses, a belly dancer (Goa)
A worshipper of death – a necromancer????? (Kabul)

If cities can dream, if cities can desire
to make it big, or in peace retire
If a city can choose between
steady love and a passionate fling
Then Bombay is the mad genius
that wants to be everything.