Frank O’Hara’s Doppelgänger Does Calisthenics at The Modern, by Barbara Krasner

6/16/2026

Double Portrait of Frank O'Hara, by Larry Rivers (USA) 1955

Frank O’Hara’s Doppelgänger Does Calisthenics at The Modern

I am peeking over Frank O’Hara’s shoulder
as he admits patrons. I am peeking
into his pocket-sized notebook
and his scribbles: tangerine, key lime, aubergine.
I am staring at Joan Mitchell’s latest:
tangerine, key lime, aubergine,
separate and then into the Betty Crocker blender
for the new American housewife. Larry Rivers
adds tangerine, maybe it’s coral, to the reef
as Washington crosses the Delaware. He’s got
blueberry and cranberry in those bogs.
Frank needs more fruit in his cornucopia.

I am peeking over Larry Rivers’ shoulder
as he paints a double portrait of Frank,
doubling down on that widow’s peak
that’s really just receding O’Hara line.
I am standing in front of Grace Hartigan,
her river bathers resisting her slashes like when
they shielded themselves from the plastics factory
explosion on the Passaic. She drapes her Persian jacket
like when my mother pulled on her Persian wool,
another attempt at cover-up she learned from Pollock.

I am peeking over Pollock’s shoulder
but it’s hard to keep my gaze. He keeps moving,
tripping over his untied laces. Lee told me
I could come to the white-out. White is all colours.
I sneak up to Lee’s studio on the second floor.
Her squares remind me of Hebrew School and I tell Frank
he has to expand his vocabulary, revert to the classics
where the masters blew pigment onto pages with hollow sticks.

Barbara Krasner

Barbara Krasner is a New Jersey-based poet and historian. She is the author of ten poetry collections, including The Night Watch (Kelsay Books, 2025), and the forthcoming The Wanderers (Shanti Arts, 2026). Her work has appeared in more than seventy journals, earning her multiple Best of the Net, Best Microfiction, and Pushcart Prize nominations. Barbara hosts The Ekphrastic Review’s Ekphrastic Book Club. Visit her author website at www.barbarakrasner.com.