A Memory of Michael McClure

by Ed Sanders

          Woodstock, NY
          in memory of my longtime
          friend & literary explorer
          Michael McClure

A bunch of us performed at Town Hall in NYC
in May of ’94 — as the finale of a 5 Day
Conference on the Beat Generation at NYU

I opened the evening by calling
William Burroughs in Lawrence, Kansas
and talked with him from the stage
to the applause of the overflow audience

Later I stood stageside and bantered
with Michael McClure & Gregory Corso  

Some of the best moments at this sort of event
are found in the intimate discourse
standing offstage or in the dressing rooms

I told McClure
that Johnny Depp
had paid 15 grand
to Kerouac’s estate
for one of
          Jack’s jackets

He & Ray Manzarek were
                    just about to go on

& Ferlinghetti
          was toning
                    his final poem

McClure flipped me
the hard Sophoclean eye & said
“I have five or six of those.”  

“So do I,” I replied,
my mind shifting cunningly
from free will
               to Good Will
thinking, of course, that
Depp will need a
2nd coat for when
the 1st is in the cleaners
& another
          for his summer home
                    & one for his manse in Nice