St. Paul and All That

alfred eisenstaedt

St. Paul and All That
Frank O’Hara


Totally abashed and smiling

I walk in
sit down and
face the frigidaire

it’s April
no May
it’s May

such little things have to be established in the morning
after the big things of night

do you want me to come? when

I think of all the things I’ve been thinking of

I feel insane

simply “life in Birmingham is hell”

simply “you will miss me
but that’s good”

when the tears of a whole generation are assembled
they will only fill a coffee cup

just because they evaporate

doesn’t mean life has heat

“this various dream of living”

I am alive with you

full of anxious pleasures and pleasurable anxiety

hardness and softness

listening while you talk and talking while you read

I read what you read

you do not read what I read

which is right, I am the one with the curiosity

you read for some mysterious reason

I read simply because I am a writer

the sun doesn’t necessarily set, sometimes is just

disappears

when you’re not here someone walks in
and says “hey,

there’s no dancer in that bed”

O the Polish summers! those drafts!

those black and white teeth!

you never come when you say you’ll come but on the

other hand you do come

[copyright Frank O’Hara, 1961]

alfred eisenstaedt

Shadow Kids

The Promenade Deck on the Queen Mary, by Sean Duggan

The Shadow Kids (lyrics)

read this and other poems in Taylor's upcoming book of poetry, Bombshell Bohemia: poems from the underground.

Queen Mary by Sean Duggan

No Amount of Pressure

alfred eisenstaedt

No Amount of Pressure
excerpt from "bathtub/wine/evening"
by Raymie Wolfe


Dad sleeps loudly in the other room. He and I have become one part in this house, no longer separate. He is one of my limbs now. Not just on my arm, but of my arm. I want to save up every tenderness for Him and put my hand on his forehead and give him comfort. I want to get behind him and hold him up, let him see the world erect, like he is used to. Old age is not for him. It's not for him and we're going to fight it to the very end.

My arms are behind him, pulling his shoulders back closer to their natural-born position; uncoiled. I am saying "breathe deep into the stretch." I imagine that when I let go he doesn't collapse. But with each breath unfurls another portion of wing, until finally I remove my hands and he flies away.

i breathe with him. and when I open my eyes i gently release him. and he falls slowly forward, into the arms of age.

it doesn't matter what prayers live in the molecules of hands
no amount of pressure releases them


[copyright Raymie Wolfe, 2008]

visit 100 Years of Raymitude

Grandfather

alfred eisenstaedt

Grandfather

read this and other poems in Taylor's upcoming book of poetry, Bombshell Bohemia: poems from the underground.

99

99
e.e. cummings

now all the fingers of this tree(darling)have
hands,and all the hands have people;and
more each particular person is(my love)
alive than every world can understand

and now you are and i am now and we're
a mystery which will never happen again,
a miracle which has never happened before--
and shining this our now must come to then

our then shall be some darkness during which
fingers are without hands;and i have no
you:and all trees are(any more than each
leafless)its silent in forevering snow

--but never fear(my own,my beautiful
my blossoming)for also then's until


[copyright E.E. Cummings, 1950]

Hemos Perdido Aun

Hemos Perdido Aun
Pablo Neruda (translation W.S. Merwin)

We have lost even this twilight.
No one saw us this evening hand in hand
while the blue night dropped on the world.

I have seen from my window
the fiesta of sunset in the distant mountain tops.

Sometimes a piece of sun
burned like a coin between my hands.

I remembered you with my soul clenched
in that sadness of mine that you know.

Where were you then?
Who else was there?
Saying what?
Why will the whole of love come on me suddenly
when I am sad and feel you are far away?

The book fell that is always turned to at twilight
and my cape rolled like a hurt dog at my feet.

Always, always you recede through the evenings
towards where the twilight goes erasing statues.


[copyright W.S. Merwin, 1969]

How to Get There

alfred eisenstaedt

How to Get There
Frank O’Hara


White the October air, no snow, easy to breathe
beneath the sky, lies, lies everywhere writhing and

gasping

clutching and tangling, it is not easy to breathe
lies building their tendrils into dim figures
who disappear down corridors in west-side apartments
into childhood’s proof of being wanted, not

abandoned, kidnapped

betrayal staving off loneliness, I see the fog lunge in
and hide it

where are you?

here I am on the sidewalk

under the moonlike lamplight thinking how

precious moss is

so unique and greenly crushable if you can find it
on the north side of the tree where the fog binds you
and then, tearing apart into soft white lies,

spreads its disease

through the primal night of an everlasting winter
which nevertheless has heat in tubes, west-side and

east-side

and its intricate individual pathways of white

accompanied

by the ringing of telephone bells beside which

someone sits in

silence denying their own number, never given out!

nameless

like the sound of troika bells rushing past suffering
in the first storm, it is snowing now,

it is already too late

the snow will go away, but nobody will be there

police cordons for lying political dignitaries ringing too
the world becomes a jangle

from the index finger

to the vast empty houses filled with people,

their echoes

of lies and the tendrils of fog trailing softly around

their throats

now the phone can be answered, nobody calling,

only an echo

all can confess to be home and waiting, all is the same
and we drift into the clear sky enthralled

by our disappointment

never to be alone again

never to be loved

sailing through space: didn’t I have you once for my
self?
West Side?
for a couple of hours, but I am not that person



[copyright Frank O’Hara, 1960]