All that false instruction
Which we never could believe


Adia Millett, Passing Shadows, 2006

March
-- by David Lehman:

Every so often my father comes over
for a visit he hangs his overcoat and hat
on my hat rack I brief him on recent
developments and serve us coffee
he is surprised that I like to cook
once when he made an omelette
he flipped it in the air much to my delight
and it landed on the floor yes that
was the summer of 1952, he remembered
the high breakers and how fearless
I was running into the ocean anyway
the important thing is to see you doing
so well he said and took his coat and hat
and left before I remembered he was dead

In memory of William R. Fox, July 12, 1944 - March 23, 2002

Wednesday Evening Services
-- by Ted Berrigan

Blindfold shores leaving sad
an audience of dancers
Frank O'Hara's dead & we are not
The General Returns
From One Place
To Another
the program was dedicated to him
but I couldn't make it

The Great Genius
-- by Ted Berrigan

The Great Genius is
A man who can do the
Ordinary thing
When everybody
Else is going crazy

Conceived in Hate
-- by Ted Berrigan

...Your America & mine
are lands to be discovered
and nothing
stirs us to discover
so much as the real
drama of today's newsmaking people

Blonde on Blonde

It's enough to make a girl
go out & buy a bottle
of peroxide; and many did.
But not her. She loved
Mencken, her pretty sister
whose shame & sin outshone
her dark, golden curls.