Crowd Gathers at Library to Honor Late Poet

2/2/2006 - On Monday evening, January 30, on the anniversary of his birth, the Gilpin County Library hosted a tribute and poetry reading in honor of the late Richard Brautigan, poet and 60s icon who, at the age of 49, committed suicide in 1984. The audience of 30-plus was treated to readings from the works of Brautigan by Gilpin County Commissioner Forrest Whitman, Karla Schorzman, Leo Goya, Sandra Sanchez, Nan Harvey, and Larry Grieco. Thanks to a recording made in 1970, the poet himself was heard from, reading his popular short story, Revenge of the Lawn, and selected poems from The Pill Versus the Springhill Mine Disaster. Grieco read the eight poems that comprise the publication of poems on packets of garden seeds, called Please Plant This Book. Brautigan distributed, free of charge, thousands of these seed collections, all gathered in small folders, on college campuses around the country in the Spring of 1968.

  Several of the featured speakers picked excerpts from The Hawkline Monster: a Gothic Western, one of Brautigan’s most popular novels. And an anonymous resident chose a short passage from the novel, So the Wind Won’t Blow It All Away, about an elderly couple who made the banks of a pond their living room because they liked to fish while sitting on their couch. The woman who presented this piece remembered reading it many years ago and always wishing she could find a place like that in the woods, but at least she was getting to live in rustic Gilpin County.

  After a break for some birthday cake and cookies, the program resumed as an open microphone session with local poets sharing some of their own work. The great turnout may spell more poetry events in the future. “We’re always looking for things that work,” said library director Larry Grieco.