Another Word on Kenneth Koch

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Another Word on Kenneth Koch

Author(s): Frank O'HaraSource: Poetry, Vol. 85, No. 6 (Mar., 1955), pp. 349-351Published by: Poetry FoundationStable URL: http://www.jstor.org/stable/20585631 .

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FRANK

O'HARA

opinion

ANOTHER WORD ON

KENNETH KOCH

"Mr. Koch, it seems, has a rare combinationof words rattling about in his skull, but it is

difficult to call

any of his

word

combinations the

bric-a-brac of poetry."

-Harry Roskolenko, Poetry, July

1954

IT IS

AMUSING to

think

of the number of gifted (even

great ) poets my epigraph applies to. Though I am in

total

disagreement with the rest of Mr. Roskolenko's

review of Poems by Kenneth Koch (Tibor de Nagy

Gallery Editions), he has

hit on

something here;

these

very original poems have little to do with the

restful

and pleasant bric-a-brac he seems to prefer (he recom

mends the

satire

of

another poet, finally, on the

grounds that "no one will be actually offended").

Mr.

Koch's

poems

have a natural

voice, they

are

quick, alert, instinctive and, within the limited scope

of

this first

volume, indicate

a

potentially impressive

variety. His technique is opposed to thatAcademic

and

often turgid development by

which

many young poets

gain praise

for

their "achievement," an achievement

limited usually to themastery of one phase of Yeats

(and usually the last).

This is

not

to

say

that

these

poems do not have theirprecedents, butMr. Koch in

tends

to "make

it

new"

Once

again

I find the

charge

accounts

And

remedies not

enough.

You

have borrowed

my gas range,

And the

steep prunes

of

my

kiss

Must

leave

you

within

the

graceless

forest

Garbage

garage

charm-account.

349







P O E T R Y

Mr. Roskolenko writes, "He is precious

and

puerile

when he is notmerely futile and noisy . . ."; but there

is

another way of reading thework. Poetry

in our time

may be distinguishedwithout being frozen. I findKoch

close to the light sensuality

of

theCavalier poets; there

is a debt, too, to those catalogues ofWhitman inwhich

the poet warmly embraces the vulgar

and inanimate

objects of everyday life and to the syntactical abbre

viations in early Auden. Most prominent as an in

fluence is the verbal playfulness and ironywe find

in

recent French poets like Raymond Roussel, Benjamin

Peret, Henri Michaux, Raymond Queneau (the latter's

infatuationwith American oddities of custom and ter

minology finds

a

native echo

in

this book)

as well as

in

our

own Theodore Roethke. Is

We drank the iced tea, then

Moved

our

ship slowly

out to

sea

While

the Infant

was

blasting

the

rose,

0

love

was

the

engine.

or

Ah, she was a tall, slim girl

Not made for

either

office-work

or

repose.

precious in a pejorative sense?

I

think not. Not the

least function

of

poetry is tomake

vivid

our sense of

themeaning of words. He tends to enlarge where

others

narrow

down. Words need not be purified

until

the tribe

has sullied them; after two generations of

continual

washing

it

is

a wonder words

have any

color

left.

I

do not wish

tomake false claims forMr. Koch:

he will

undoubtedly not,

from

the

indications

of

this

volume,write a Gray's Elegy. He has the other poetic

gift: vivacity

and

go, originality of perception and in

toxication

with

life. Most

important

of

all, he is not

dull.

350







FRANK

O'HARA

BABETTE DEUTSCH

But

rather than

describemy

own

pleasure

in

the

work,

here is a

speech from

scene 5

of

the

play,

Pericles, in

which the

technical

glitter enhances

a

characteristically positive

emotional statement.

There's no

midnight

mystery

and no coconuts here to see,

nothing but the

ocean's sea

which

will wash

history's

tattoos from

me;

I

hope to live

satisfactorily

like a capon

that's struck

by a tree

and

does die

gladly

bereft,

0

large,

of his

sexuality.

Oh

as

honey

fills

the bee

while

the

waves'

orchestra's

business spree

sticks its

night in

your head like

a

country,

and as themadman throws the flea

to

music,

helplessly,

here

always shall

I be

and

not in

idolatry,

but yet

superfluous as a

ski

in

a

barge; while

the withered

air

reduces baneful

boughs to

everywhere.

FRANK

O'HARA

THE

MORALITY OF

THE

POET

The Desert

Music and

Other Poems, by

William Carlos

Williams.

Random House.

$3.00.

NOT

THE

LEAST

FANTASTIC ELEMENT

in

The Arabian

Nights'

Entertainments

is the realism

that one en

counters

in

themidst of

the

incrediblemarvels,

a

real

351





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