At the conclusion of the opening episode of Mad Men’s
second season, the show’s protagonist, Don Draper, buys a book of poetry after
being told by a hipster in a Greenwich Village bar that he is incapable of
appreciating the writer’s work. The book is Meditations
in an Emergency by Frank O’Hara. Draper reads it later that night in his
suburban home, and he is captivated by a haunting stanza from the poem
Mayakovsky:
"Now I am quietly waiting for the catastrophe of my
personality to seem beautiful again, and interesting, & modern. "
After inscribing the book with the simple message “Made
me think of you”, Draper slips out of the house to post it to a mystery
recipient, adding yet another layer to this most complicated of TV heroes. I
was so struck with this detail that I started to read about this this poet. I
was only vaguely aware of him before Mad
Men. I have continued to read about him & to delve into his poetry.
Frank O'Hara grew up in Grafton, Massachusetts. He
attended St. John's High School in Worcester & later studied piano at the
New England Conservatory in Boston from 1941 to 1944. O'Hara served in the Navy
seeing action in the South Pacific (the geographic area, not the Rodgers & Hammerstein musical) &
Japan on the destroyer USS Nicholas during World War II.
With the funding made available to veterans he attended
Harvard University, where he roomed with artist & writer Edward Gorey. Although
he majored in music & did some composing, his attendance was irregular
& his interests scattered.
He regularly attended classes in philosophy &
theology, while writing impulsively in his spare time. O'Hara was heavily
influenced by visual art, & by contemporary music, which was his first love
(he remained a fine piano player all his life & would often shock his
tricks by suddenly playing swathes of Rachmaninoff ). He did have favorite
poets: Arthur Rimbaud, Stephane Mallarmé, Boris Pasternak, & Vladimir
Mayakovsky. While at Harvard, O'Hara met John Ashbery & began publishing
poems in the Harvard Advocate. Despite his love of music, O'Hara changed his
major & graduated from Harvard in 1950 with a degree in English.
He then attended graduate school at the University of Michigan
in Ann Arbor. While at Michigan, he won a Hopwood Award & received his M.A.
in English literature 1951.
That autumn O'Hara moved into an apartment in NYC with
Joe LeSueur, who would be his lover for the next 11 years. Known throughout his
life for his extreme sociability, passion, & warmth, O'Hara had hundreds of
friends & lovers throughout his life, many from the NYC art & poetry
worlds. Soon after arriving in NYC, he found at the front desk of the Museum of
Modern Art & began to write seriously.
O'Hara always remained active in the art world, working
as a reviewer for Art News, & in 1960 was made Assistant Curator of
Painting & Sculpture Exhibitions for the Museum of Modern Art. He was also
friends with the artists Willem de Kooning, Larry Rivers & Joan Mitchell.
O'Hara died following an accident on Fire Island in which
he was struck by a man speeding in a beach buggy during the early morning hours
of July 24, 1966. He died the next day of a ruptured liver at the age of 40.
Frank’s poetry is gay poetry. It is poetry by a gay poet
who knows that he is gay & doesn't care what his readers would think. But
in its breezy affirmation of his gayness, his poetry immediately grabs back at
what is universal.
Having a Coke with You
is even more fun than going to San Sebastian, Irún,
Hendaye, Biarritz, Bayonne
or being sick to my stomach on the Travesera de Gracia in
Barcelona
partly because in your orange shirt you look like a
better happier St. Sebastian
partly because of my love for you, partly because of your
love for yogurt
partly because of the fluorescent orange tulips around
the birches
The gay references are all there (St. Sebastian, etc.)
but it all balances so effortlessly with the simply rendered feeling of human closeness.
O’ Hara’s gayness is an expression of his humanity, & the other way around. He brought a refreshing new casualness & spontaneity to American poetry, making deliriously funny & surprisingly moving verse out of everyday
activities recounted in conversational tones. What he called his “I do this I
do that” poems often featured glimpses of his adored NYC or anecdotes
about friend, most of whom were themselves poets or painters.
