About The Book

Frank O’Hara was one of the great poets of the twentieth century and, along with such widely acclaimed writers as Denise Levertov, Allen Ginsberg, Robert Creeley, and Gary Snyder, a crucial contributor to what Donald Allen termed the New American Poetry, “which, by its vitality alone, became the dominant force in the American poetic tradition.”

This collection is a reissue of a volume first published by Grove Press in 1957, and it demonstrates beauti”fully the flawless rhythm underlying O’Hara’s conviction that to write poetry, indeed to live, “you just go on your nerve.”

Praise

“O’Hara, a key interpreter of the aesthetics of abstract-expressionism, was a vital presence in New York’s dynamic postwar art world, whether as a curator at the Museum of Modem Art, a visionary critic, a lushly original and lyrical poet, or an unflagging, often outrageous socialite.” –Donna Seaman, Booklist

‘moving in the way that only simple communication can be moving. . . . His poems always manage a fresh start free from the dreadful posturings of the conventional verse of his generation.” –Kenneth Rexroth, The New York Times Book Review

Awards

Featured on television’s Mad Men

Excerpt

Poem

The eager note on my door said “Call me,
call when you get in!” so I quickly threw
a few tangerines into my overnight bag,
straightened my eyelids and shoulders, and

headed straight for the door. It was autumn
by the time I got around the corner, oh all
unwilling to be either pertinent or bemused, but
the leaves were brighter than grass on the sidewalk!

Funny, I thought, that the lights are on this late
and the hall door open; still up at this hour, a
champion jai-alai player like himself? Oh fie!
for shame! What a host, so zealous! And he was

there in the hall, flat on a sheet of blood that
ran down the stairs. I did appreciate it. There are few
hosts who so thoroughly prepare to greet a guest
only casually invited, and the several months ago.