Foretopman

            

   

    A surprising violence in the sky

    inspired me to my first public act

    nubile and pretentious but growing pure

    as the whitecaps are the wind's

    but a surface agitation of the waters

    means a rampart on the ocean floor is falling

    And will soon be open to the tender

    governing tides of a reigning will

    while alterable noon assumes its virtue

Frank O'Hara

The Collected Poems

  of Frank O'Hara

  It seems far away and gentle now

  [extract]

  1956

Donald Allen, editor

op. cit.