One-Sentence Journal by Chris La Tray

One-Sentence Journal by Chris La Tray

FROM THE 2023 MONTANA POET LAUREATE...

Winner of the 2018 Montana Book Award

and the 2019 High Plains Book Award

“La Tray is a perimeter man, seeing the reality in wildness yet dealing the best he can at rec­onciling truth in nature.” - Barry Babcock author of Teachers in the Forest

This book is a collection of poems and essays from the writer’s experiences of travelling through landscapes both wild and civilized. They speak with delicate simplicities ranging from the death of a favorite pickup truck, to the joy of hitting the trail with a four-legged companion. There are also profound observations that range from realizing he has become an aging hippie in a Carhartt vest, to the exhilaration of following the tracks of a grizzly in fresh snow.

“(This) book truly represents excellence in Montana literature and is an important contribution to the genreThe committee of readers was unanimous in our selection.”

— Elizabeth Jonkel, Chair of the Montana Book Award Committee

“This book is proof of the power of language, even at its most spare.”

— Russell Rowland, author of Fifty-Six Counties

“With a humble and grave generosity to all things and people who cross his path, La Tray reminds us all to slow down and take stock of our surroundings. Attention is the true work of a writer and poet, a tribe La Tray can proudly call himself to be.”

— Charles Finn, editor of High Desert Journal

“This is a sunrise book, a book of revelations, of creekwalks and roadfood and ordinary sadnesses, ordinary joys—which are, in the end, the only kind.”

— Joe Wilkins, author of Fall Back Down When I Die

Chris La Tray, an enrolled member of the Little Shell Tribe of Chippewa Indians, is a writer and photographer who lives just outside Missoula, Montana. His work has appeared in various magazines, collections and anthologies.

It has been suggested that, because of the nature of his work, Chris La Tray must smell like Yukon gold dust, spruce tips, and cedar waxwings. He hopes it’s true.

His book, Becoming Little Shell, will be released by Milkweed Editions in 2022.