The laureate rocks

“‘Tell me, what is it you plan to do / With your one wild and precious life?’” 

I didn’t expect to hear Mary Oliver’s verse from Montana’s poet laureate, and here Chris La Tray recited her “The Summer Day.” We listened, then bent our heads to draw.

I’d been internet sleuthing La Tray for weeks. He seemed to be everywhere but Kalispell. Then I saw he was coming to Flathead Valley Community College late last month for an art and poetry event hosted by Allyson Norwood Bush, of the Montana Art Therapy Association.