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Frank O'Hara

Frank O'Hara Books

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Lunch Poems

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Odes

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Early writing

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“How am I to become a legend, my dear? I’ve tried love, but that hides you in the bosom of another and I am always springing forth from it like the lotus—the ecstasy of always bursting forth! (but one must not be distracted by it!) or like a hyacinth, “to keep the filth of life away,” yes, there, even in the heart, where the filth is pumped in and courses and slanders and pollutes and determines. I will my will, though I may become famous for a mysterious vacancy in that department, that greenhouse.”

LoveFame
Book:Meditations in an Emergency
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“Why do you play such dreary music on Saturday afternoon, when tired mortally tired I long for a little reminder of immortal energy? All week long while I trudge fatiguingly from desk to desk in the museum you spill your miracles of Grieg and Honegger on shut-ins. Am I not shut in too, and after a week of work don’t I deserve Prokofieff? Well, I have my beautiful de Kooning to aspire to. I think it has an orange bed in it, more than the ear can hold.”

ArtEnergyMusicPoemTiredRadioMuseums
Book:Lunch Poems
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“I have, for my own projected works and ideas, only the silliest and dewiest of hopes; no matter what, I am romantic enough or sentimental enough to wish to contribute something to life's fabric, to the world's beauty.... [S]imply to live does not justify existence, for life is a mere gesture on the surface of the earth, and death a return to that from which we had never been wholly separated; but oh to leave a trace, no matter how faint, of that brief gesture! For someone, some day, may find it beautiful!”

WorldMayDoeIdeasMatterEnoughEarthBeautifulLife IsWishMy OwnExistenceReturnNo Matter WhatMereSurfaceJustifyGesturesFabricSentimental
Author:Frank O'Hara
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“Mothers of America let your kids go to the movies! get them out of the house so they won't know what you're up to it's true that fresh air is good for the body but what about the soul that grows in darkness, embossed by silvery images and when you grow old as grow old you must they won't hate you”

KnowsSoulBodyKidsAmericaMotherHateHouseGrowsDarknessAirHate YouFresh AirOld You
Book:Lunch Poems: 50th Anniversary Edition
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“Too many poets act like a middle-aged mother trying to get her kids to eat too much cooked meat, and potatoes with drippings (tears). I don't give a damn whether they eat or not. Forced feeding leads to excessive thinness (effete). Nobody should experience anything they don't need to, if they don't need poetry bully for them. I like the movies too. And after all, only Whitman and Crane and Williams, of the American poets, are better than the movies.”

IfsNeedsGivingShouldTryingKidsMotherToo MuchMiddleTearsPoetDamnMeatFeedingBullyPotatoesMiddle AgedDrippingDon't Give A DamnCranesI Don't Give A DamnThinnessMeat And Potatoes
Author:Frank O'Hara
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“After the first glass of vodka you can accept just about anything of life even your own mysteriousness you think it is nice that a box of matches is purple and brown and is called La Petite and comes from Sweden for they are words that you know and that is all you know words not their feelings or what they mean and you write because you know them not because you understand them because you don't you are stupid and lazy and will never be great but you do what you know because what else is there?”

ThinkingKnowsWritingFirstsMeanFeelingsAcceptingNiceStupidGlassesBoxesBrownLazyPurpleSwedenVodkaPetite
Book:The Collected Poems of Frank O'Hara
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“My Heart I'm not going to cry all the time nor shall I laugh all the time, I don't prefer one "strain" to another. I'd have the immediacy of a bad movie, not just a sleeper, but also the big, overproduced first-run kind. I want to be at least as alive as the vulgar. And if some aficionado of my mess says "That's not like Frank!," all to the good! I don't wear brown and grey suits all the time, do I? No. I wear workshirts to the opera, often. I want my feet to be bare, I want my face to be shaven, and my heart--you can't plan on the heart, but the better part of it, my poetry, is open.”

IfsWantFirstsHeartKindBigsRunningFacesLaughingAlivePlansFeetCryMy HeartSuitsMessBrownPoetry IsOperaFrankGreyVulgarStrainImmediacySleepersBad Movies
Book:The Collected Poems of Frank O'Hara
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“I don't believe in god, so I don't have to make elaborately sounded structures. ... Pain always produces logic, which is very bad for you. ... As for measure and other technical apparatus, that's just common sense: if you're going to buy a pair of pants you want them to be tight enough so everyone will want to go to bed with you. There's nothing metaphysical about it.”

IfsWantBelieveEnoughPainCommonProduceBedLogicStructureDon't BelieveCommon SensePairsBelieve In GodPantsMetaphysical
Author:Frank O'Hara
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“Poem (Lana Turner has collapsed!) Lana Turner has collapsed! I was trotting along and suddenly it started raining and snowing and you said it was hailing but hailing hits you on the head hard so it was really snowing and raining and I was in such a hurry to meet you but the traffic was acting exactly like the sky and suddenly I see a headline LANA TURNER HAS COLLAPSED! there is no snow in Hollywood there is no rain in California I have been to lots of parties and acted perfectly disgraceful but I never actually collapsed oh Lana Turner we love you get up”

Has BeensSaidHardPartyActingSkyLove YouRainHollywoodSnowGet UpCaliforniaTrafficHeadlinesDisgracefulTurnerTrotting
Book:Lunch Poems: 50th Anniversary Edition
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“However, I have never clogged myself with the praises of pastoral life, nor with nostalgia for an innocent past of perverted acts in pastures. No. One need never leave the confines of New York to get all the greenery one wishes—I can’t even enjoy a blade of grass unless I know there’s a subway handy, or a record store or some other sign that people do not totally regret life. It is more important to affirm the least sincere; the clouds get enough attention as it is and even they continue to pass. Do they know what they’re missing? Uh huh.”

PeopleKnowsNeedsI CanImportantEnoughPastWishEnjoyAttentionRecordsMissingNew YorkRegretPraiseCloudsStoresNostalgiaInnocentGrassSincereBladesSubwayHandyPasturesBlades Of GrassRecord StoresGreenery
Book:The Collected Poems of Frank O'Hara
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