Mazel Tov Doug and Frank!

Married!  More pictures here.  NYT announcement here. ( Ed. note: Doug wrote to me about Stacie Turner's photographs:  "I like her subject line. In fact, the minister said something more thrilling even than that. "Let no person and no LAW put asunder." Although you can't see it in the photos, we were standing in front of a window that depicts Thomas Hooker, founder of Connecticut. He's the one who said "As God gave us liberty, let us take it." So I guess we were standing in the right place." - sdh)

From "Dining out wth Doug and Frank" by James Schuyler:
II

Now it's tomorrow,
as usual. Turned out that
Doug (Douglas Crase, the poet)
had to work (he makes his bread
writing speeches): thirty pages
explaining why Eastman Kodak's
semi-slump (?) is just what
the stockholders ordered. He
looked glum, and declined
a drink. By the by did you know
that John Ashbery's grandfather
was offered an investment-in
when George Eastman founded his
great corporation? He turned it
down. Eastman Kodak will survive.
"Yes" and where would our
John be now? I can't imagine him
any different than he is,
a problem which does not arise,
so I went with Frank (the poet,
he makes his dough as a librarian,
botanical librarian at Rutgers
and as a worker he's a beaver:
up at 5:30, home after 7, but
over striped bass he said he
had begun to see the unwisdom
of his ways and next week will
revert to the seven-hour day
for which he's paid. Good. Time
and energy to write. Poetry
takes it out of you, or you
have to have a surge to bring
to it. Words. So useful and
pleasant) to dine at McFeely's
at West 23rd and Eleventh Avenue
by the West River, which is
the right name for the Hudson
when it bifurcates from
the East River to create
Manhattan "an isle of joy."
Take my word for it, don't
(shall I tell you about my
friend who effectively threw
himself under a train in
the Times Square station?
No. Too tender to touch. In
fact, at the moment I've blocked
out his name. No I haven't:
Peter Kemeny, gifted and tormented
fat man) listen to anyone
else.

-- sdh

Comments

[John Latta]

The poem, of course, is by James Schuyler, not Frank O'Hara, who'd been dead for eight years by the time Crase and Polach met in 1974.

John Latta

[The Best American Poetry]

Yikes! Thanks for the catch John.
Stacey

[Laura Orem]

Congratulations, indeed! And I love that there is an announcement in the Weddings section of the NYTimes - surely a sign that we are finally moving into the 21st century.

Blessings and joy to you both!