Frank O’Hara

By Ted Berrigan 1934–1983 Ted Berrigan

Winter in the country, Southampton, pale horse

as the soot rises, then settles, over the pictures

The birds that were singing this morning have shut up

I thought I saw a couple kissing, but Larry said no

It’s a strange bird. He should know. & I think now

“Grandmother divided by monkey equals outer space.” Ron

put me in that picture. In another picture, a good-

looking poet is thinking it over, nevertheless, he will

never speak of that it. But, his face is open, his eyes

are clear, and, leaning lightly on an elbow, fist below

his ear, he will never be less than perfectly frank,

listening, completely interested in whatever there may

be to hear. Attentive to me alone here. Between friends,

nothing would seem stranger to me than true intimacy.

What seems genuine, truly real, is thinking of you, how

that makes me feel. You are dead. And you’ll never

write again about the country, that’s true.

But the people in the sky really love

to have dinner & to take a walk with you.

Source: The Collected Poems of Ted Berrigan (University of California Press, 2005)

Biography

Ted Berrigan—Edmund Joseph Michael Berrigan Jr.—was born in Providence, Rhode Island, the oldest of three children of Margaret Dugan and Edmund Berrigan, the chief engineer at Ward's Baking Company. On both sides the family was Irish Catholic. Berrigan attended local schools and entered Providence College, a local Catholic school, but left after a year and enlisted in the army.

Berrigan was sent to Korea in 1954 but never saw . . .

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