I've completed a few more sections of the Monk poem. I have 8 sections written, though ironically I had to scrap the Bemsha Swing section when I discovered on re-reading it that it was no good. I'm working on "Ugly Beauty" today. It strikes me that the phrase has two meanings. "It seems beautiful, yes, but it's a really "ugly" kind of beauty." Or, what seems ugly is really beautiful.

I also came across a line from Ashbery that I want to use as a title for a poem: THE CLEAN FART GENITAL ENTHUSIASTIC TOE PRICK ALBUM SERIOUS EVENING FLAMES.

Unfortunately no poem could be as good as that title, so I probably won't be able to use it.

I'm using the phrase "Poems Retrieved" as the tentative title for my second manuscript. Does that sound too presumptuous? I guess I could say "Poems Retrieved (Tentative Title)," which would be much worse. I'd hate to have someone 20 years from now order the book by mistake on the internet and find out it's not by Frank O'Hara.