And Here's To You, Mr. Mcclure (For Michael Mcclure 1932-2020) Poem by LeeAnn Azzopardi

I waited for the day and today is that day
To read in the New York Times
And the San Francisco Chronicle of yr death
Mr. McClure, I wish I knew you
And was old enough to have lived in the sixites
Reading along beside you
As you read "The Death of 100 Whales"
I wanted to be part of movement
Communing with the likes of Janis and Jim
But there was no movement when I was young
My generation just wanted to make money and having status
Only me was lost in poetry
Daydreaming of being a radical
Stopping the Bomb-and the jerks like the Donald
With their capitalist ideas
Of making everyone homeless except the rich
And now, the sixties are truly gone
Forever in the textbooks marked History
As this new century is becoming soundbites
On CNN