Having a Coke with You
is even more fun than going to San Sebastian, Irún, Hendaye, Biarritz, Bayonne
or being sick to my stomach on the Travesera de Gracia in Barcelona
partly because in your orange shirt you look like a better happier St. Sebastian
partly because of my love for you, partly because of your love for yoghurt
partly because of the fluorescent orange tulips around the birches
partly because of the secrecy our smiles take on before people and statuary
it is hard to believe when I’m with you that there can be anything as still
as solemn as unpleasantly definitive as statuary when right in front of it
in the warm New York 4 o’clock light we are drifting back and forth
between each other like a tree breathing through its spectacles
and the portrait show seems to have no faces in it at all, just paint
you suddenly wonder why in the world anyone ever did them
I look
at you and I would rather look at you than all the portraits in the world
except possibly for the Polish Rider occasionally and anyway it’s in the Frick
which thank heavens you haven’t gone to yet so we can go together the first time
and the fact that you move so beautifully more or less takes care of Futurism
just as at home I never think of the Nude Descending a Staircase or
at a rehearsal a single drawing of Leonardo or Michelangelo that used to wow me
and what good does all the research of the Impressionists do them
when they never got the right person to stand near the tree when the sun sank
or for that matter Marino Marini when he didn’t pick the rider as carefully
as the horse
it seems they were all cheated of some marvelous experience
which is not going to go wasted on me which is why I am telling you about it
Frank O’Hara
The poem, Having a Coke with You, is one of my favorite poems. It is a love poem, but it is not written like a Hallmark card and overly "mushy." The speaker in the poem is clearly an art enthusiast, because he alludes to many pieces of artwork and artists. I feel a personal connection with the poem because in the first stanza the speaker speaks of, "the secrecy our smiles take on before people and statuary." In high school it is typical that people become infatuated with people that "they aren't supposed to." This unfortunate high school cliche is my current situation. I understand the secretive glances toward each other, the smiles that everyone else sees as simply kindness. The symbolism of the color orange, that is mentioned twice in the first stanza, is very important in my connection because orange is symbolic of energy and liveliness. The color is there to describe how the speaker feels when that special person is around. The butterflies that arise and the happiness that bubbles up inside of you when that one person is there. The many comparisons of the lover to the beauty of certain pieces of art and the way the speaker wants nothing more than this love. Nothing can compare to their love. It's special.
The poem makes me think of my favorite book, The Hunger Games, in which Peeta is so desperately in love with Katniss that he will do anything for her. They are the "star-crossed lovers" like a modern Romeo and Juliet. He is willing to lay down his life for her and he tells her that even though he noticed a lot of other girls, but "none of them ever stuck, not like (Katniss)." Every time I read "Having a Coke with You" I immediately think of The Hunger Games. The typical love story with a twist is a similar tale to this unconventional love poem.
