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Teachers & SchoolsMemory and the Past
"The Day Lady Died" is firmly rooted in the present moment, so much so that the O'Hara uses the present tense until the final stanza. But the past is lurking just behind the everyday activities and errands that concern the speaker for most of the poem. Like an underground reservoir that suddenly bubbles up, a glance at a newspaper is enough to send the speaker spinning back into the past, to remembering the night at the 5-Spot when he heard Billie Holiday sing.
The poem hints that the speaker knows about Billie Holiday's death even before seeing her picture in the New York Post.