I’m shopping “love in the hunting season”
by Devorah Major
from book I’m shopping “love in the hunting season”
usa fire alarm
the house is burning
we can smell its smoke
sparks singe the curtains
our eyes water as growing fires
sizzle at our front and back doors
on the top floors
some of the residents
are in a thick fog sleep
in the darkened basement
others are trapped
straight–backed and frightened
i sit in the living room
i am not alone
the house is burning
the arsonists say
they will rebuild the frame
with our bones
glue together ashes for the walls
they have no need to
replace the windows
i have a bucket of water at my feet
where should I throw it
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