Yesterday's acrostic from Frank O'Hara to Vincent Warren gave the chance to revisit a switchback stair on an Aus-trian river and passages in Fitzgerald, supported by an illustration cropped more in favor of the two texts than the equally stylish tower. I furnish the original here, in deference to the builder's art.
Principal interest lay in forti-fying O'Hara's reference to our cus-tom, possibly instinctive, to give dating to memory, and more than as a mnemonic precaution. The Roman sys-tem in this illustration is expedi-ent, gifted as it is for suggesting recurrence or continuity, and specificity at the same time. As in the tower over the Mur, the elements repeat themselves in clarifying con-summation. Blondness and Rimbaudness may have contributed their claims, but dating is ironically supreme. Even as we indulge a birth date, yet do we live. None of our reinforcements of the text can reasonably be seen as fortifying the sufficiency of poetry.
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