Living It Up at The Dead Poet

I need to find the owner of The Dead Poet, a bar on the Upper West Side of Manhattan, because s/he is clearly my soul mate. I've walked by this place a bunch of times but had never stopped in until my friend Jeremy suggested we go there after our dinner "date" last night.

The Dead Poet's signature drink, which they describe mysteriously as being made with seven spirits and tasting like grape soda. Jeremy and I decided that it tasted more like grape juice than soda and that it was indeed potent.

 Jeremy is a fan of hole-in-the-wall places and made the accurate observation that the UWS doesn't have many. He felt the Dead Poet qualified, though I'd describe it as a crack-in-the-wall instead; it is tiny, but it's pretty long. Instead of feeling dank, though, its dimness is cozy due to wood paneling and a prominent light fixture shaped like a London street lamp from the days of gas illumination. In addition, framed quotations from great poems cover the walls (along, alas, with TV screens broadcasting sporting events). There is a neon jukebox, modern instead of vintage with a touchscreen, but it is set into shelving lined with cloth bound books of poetry. If I had to criticize the place, I'd say that it's a bit incongruous, and that it needs to decide whether it is a cozy, highbrow joint reminiscent of an era long-gone or whether it is a sports bar. The patrons, at least on a Tuesday night, seemed to be the type who'd inhabit the former, however. No one was really watching the TVs at all (except me, because there happened to be a Vandy basketball game on), and the jukebox remained untouched with only its surrounding books for company; as a result, it played a somewhat jarring mix of Beatles songs interspersed with Tupac and Dr. Dre.

Any questions I may have had about whether or not this place was for me vanished once I began to peruse their drink menu. Of course one can order wine or beer - and their selection is extensive - but their cocktail list was an absolute thrill for a literature geek like me. In many cases, their offerings are standard mixtures, like a sidecar called the Langston Hughes which sounded pretty much like it contained the same ingredients you'd find in any sidecar. But there were house-created offerings too, however, which were creative and tasty. The best part, however, was that the menu described how the ingredients in and flavor of each drink embodied the poet (or, in some cases, author) it was named for.

The sidecar is called the Langston Hughes because of his, and its, popularity during the Harlem Renaissance and Jazz Era. As a fan of both his work and the vanilla vodka and melon liqueur in his dedicated beverage, I ordered the Robert Frost. Jeremy ordered a Mark Twain, reminiscent of Mississippi mud and good times with its espresso vodka and Irish cream. The Tennessee Williams is an ode to the flavors of the south that Williams wrote about so vividly, mixing sweet tea vodka, water, and lemon juice. The W.B. Yeats is green, to echo the Irish landscape he wrote about so lovingly. You get the idea. There are also a variety of signature shots available. The Dante, for example, combines tequila with a shot of Tabasco, evoking the fires of Hell which Dante explored in his Inferno to any daring enough to try it. (We weren't.) If I can't own a place like this, and right now it does not seem to be in the cards, I plan to visit it. Often. I need to get through the whole canon, after all.

The Mark Twain and the Robert Frost (and Jeremy's neck).

Experiences like this make me sorry I always taught kids who were too young to take to bars. Think of the educational value!