Ted Berrigan‘s birthday. Ted adored Allen. Alongside the late-lamented Frank O’Hara, he was the one. Ted had this embarrassingly patriotic poetic tribal conceit, and in that context Allen was “the President” of Poetry (analogous to Allen’s own gleeful imaginative “shadow cabinet” – “Vachel Lindsay Secretary of the Interior/Poe Secretary of Imagination/Pound Secty. of Economics..” (Death to Van Gogh’s Ear)

a particular poetic form (a quintessential “New York School” form) – the list poem

OUR FRIENDS Ron: the tight-ass Dick: the insignificant Pat: the dowdy old lady Anne: the superficial sentimentalist Bill: the spoiled … Read More