To Kiss Frank...

make out with him a bit, this is what my friend would like to do oh these too many dead summers later, and as much as I want to stroll with her into the poet's hazy fancy all I can see is O'Hara's long-gone lips fallen free of the bone, slumbering beneath the grainy soil. I can hear Frank's dry voice combing the air for song, but what I see is his skeleton entombed in dust, wrapped in his dapper suit, his razzle-dazzle sunglasses. She sees him alive, ambling down a sidewalk, all of New York clambering into the sky behind him, cuff links winking, his dear friends waving, calling him by name like they do in the city: 800,000 people and you step outside for a smoke and see someone you know. That's how it is with death. Those you love come at you like lightning, crackle for an instant—so kissable— and then lips and all, they're gone.