oh yes we were hip to Frank O’Hara

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I was thinking about
the American poet 
Frank O’Hara this morn 
we were sitting in a UK café 
a poet friend and I 
when his name came up 
seemingly out of the sky 
we both admire his words 
and called to mind 
his 1959 title
‘The day lady died’ 
which is one of his 
and then and then and then-type
Lunch Poems
and we fell to wondering 
could he have ever 
in his wildest imaginings 
thought that two writers 
in twenty twenty-five 
and an Atlantic Ocean away 
would be able to say 
parts of his poem out loud
and be heartened 
that a good poem may 
in the end 
have an existence 
far beyond itself
so that 
endeavour and achievement 
prove well worth the effort 
and there’s every reason 
to keep on keeping on 
right to the end 
just as he 
and Billie Holiday 
always did 
in their abruptly though 
abbreviated lives
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Jeff Cloves
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O’Hara was killed in a freak beach buggy accident in 1966 he was 40
Billie Holiday died in 1959 she was 44

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