Listening to Richard Brautigan
On January 30, 2012 Richard Brautigan would be 77 years old, had he not died 28 years ago at the same age I am today. He was born in 1935, the same year as my father, and I’ve often marveled that two men of the exact same era could have such different experiences and lives. But the world is a giant ball so we’re on the same side after all.
Somehow many years ago I acquired a cassette dupe of his Listening to Richard Brautigan record, and was surprised by the sound of Brautigan’s voice, an almost cartoonish sound that was much different from the one I had imagined narrating all those books of his I’d read. It was deep yet innocent, awkward almost, like a child inside a large bear costume unicycling mischievously and wrecklessly through a formal ballroom dinner party. Once I was over the shock, I enjoyed it and even found a strange comfort in it.
And so I began to write this song. But years passed and I’d revisit it now and again, changing something here, adding something there, waiting for the right context for it before I committed to finishing it. Then earlier this month, I heard about a Brautigan Book Club that had formed with the aim of reading a novel and gathering for a performance and other “Brautigan-inspired activities” each month. As they say in their manifesto, “Brautigan – through his writing and because of his mythic quality – makes a fantastic starting point for creative endeavors.”
Well, yes indeed. Maybe I’ll record a Brautigan-inspired song each month for the rest of the year, based on each month’s selection by the book club. Maybe I will….
LISTENING TO RICHARD BRAUTIGAN
He wrote mini-poems about life’s miniature things
Read them in a voice not unlike hippos sprouting wings
You could almost feel devout again
Listening to Richard Brautigan
He lived way out west between the hippies and the beats
He was really tall so I assume he had big feets
He was up & out and down & in
And his name was Richard Brautigan
Can you see the sea a tidal wave of pumpkins rollin’
Can you feel the way her body looks and write it down
Were the deeds done and then done again as your life is done
Can you burn a song and as it melts describe the sound
He would be your catfish friend and drive sad thoughts away
Hitchhike across Galilee in an old Model A
Watch her long blonde beauty play with gentle glass and things
Shadows of the wild birds of heaven and their black wings
“God lives like music in the skin,
And sounds like a sunshine harpsichord.”
He died in Bolinas back in 1984
He escaped steel spiderwebs by blowing down the door
Kisses in a vase at dawn again
Save them all for Richard Brautigan
Can you see the sea a tidal wave of pumpkins rollin’
Can you feel the way her body looks and write it down
Were the deeds done and then done again as your life is done
Can you burn a song and as it melts describe the sound
My Father’s almost Zenlike ability to inhabit fractions of time was one of the things that made him truly amazing. ~ Ianthe Brautigan
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