Ron Peters's Reviews > Lunch Poems

I’m no poetry guy, but I keep trying a swig now and again to see how it goes down. These, at least, are short…

O’Hara was a New York poet at the time of the Beat Generation, Lawrence Ferlinghetti (who originally published this book), Allen Ginsberg, et al. But his poetry was different, with a loose and easy-going lilt, focused on slices of life in the Big Apple and often written, as the title says, on his lunch hour.

He was a curator at the Museum of Modern Art, no less. This certainly accounts for the many references to contemporary painters. Judging by the content of these poems, his work left him time for sleeping in, much coffee drinking, and lunch time meanders.

In my head, while reading these, I could hear Bill Evans playing jazz piano at the Village Vanguard. These poems are a champagne and cognac cocktail. The one about the death of Billie Holliday stayed with me.

Occasional phrases out of the blue are very nice, and the poems themselves bounce around at random. O’Hara was plainly erudite; more than me. Quite a few of his references were over my head, and I can honestly say I have no idea at all what some of his poems mean. I disliked two or three of them (pooping just once a week? TMI).

Occasionally O’Hara reminded me of William Carlos Williams, but cooler, more intellectual. A bit like Walt Whitman now and again – with “O,” this and “O,” that. I read somewhere or other that the tone of O’Hara’s poems about everyday New York life was one inspiration for the television series Mad Men. I can see that.

This book is yet another one from the list of David Bowie’s 100 faves...