Shaken not stirred Ma’am

(For Frankie)

It is hard to see things abstract.

We are more accurate Now

Encapsulating climate

When we mention Culture.

Let’s look at Value:

Price tag says, “As Is”.

No complexities.

No narcissism.

Loathsome luminaries loaded

In ink, inebriated, inoculated,

Imbibed in itself-“As Is”.

The Sardines became the Gollum.

O’Hara, Oh everywhere, oh Sun, Oh oranges!

Can you feel the rust coming on,

Or is it Out?

Aren’t we all magnetized toward the morbid,

the dark, the obscure, obtuse, or abstract,

as they can be good for hiding things in corners, 

shading over or making shadows. This depth 

achieves something like,

making good on promises.

Sometimes he seemed gay,

they say, he was happy, in so many words.

All the time, they say, they were true,

the poems. Because they were simple

they cannot tell lies.

Portraiture is paraphrased,

how does one escape?

Clouds come and go.

Meanwhile, the pastoral artist demonstrating

how much one can hold,

runs out of colors, runs out to resupply,
runs hot, then cold.

Any poem can be an apocalypse,

this is how they all End

(in grey), 
except the last words say,

All days look the same. 



Image credit by Berenice Abbott, 'Radio row (NYC), 1936' in [Public domain or Public domain], via Wikimedia Commons.

I'll Be Frank with You

Strangers we are
and always have been
on other shores, lifetimes away
archived thankfully for someday
like this opening in my schedule.

I've done some looking in
to you, and wonder where you are
really from, I mean I get where you are
coming from, of the Hara, the place?
Or is it the Shiva or Scarlett's Hara?

I was taken in by many and none
the lineage leads to nowhere
but a sweet little eden, a valley lush
trees wearing afro dos, creeks trilling
through the dell-it clearly chose me
as you can tell.

I thought of a poem I wrote before
we had lunch yesterday, about a poet
who paints with words on white,
like still life, making space
more appealing. I forgot
to mention how much I enjoyed
Guadalajara, the pictures of Ashes Buried,
your instruction manual too, Mr. O'Hara.

Of course this was all before
page 163
of Secondary Colors
just past Orange
that banana split second-mutilated
dislocated from living just like that
taken away at 3-
on a beach! And what's more?!
It was not mine...
O the Horror!
These letters are just too much for me...

Pacifically.Stationed.
(this was long too early, I needed something like you there)

This poem was inspired by the poet Frank O'Hara and his poem specifically, Why I am not a painter.

Image by Sanford Robinson Gifford (1823-1880) [Public domain], via Wikimedia Commons,  painting described as Fire Island Beach, NY.