WSU Remembers Colorful Poet Sanchez Impact As Colleague, Mentor, Role Model Recalled On Day Of Funeral In El Paso

He was Don Ricardo, Dr. Sanchez, and in a tilt at the titles-conscious world of academia, Ricardo Sanchez, GED, Ph.D.

Jeanette Lujan remembered the man weak with stomach cancer but eager to drink tequila and sing Mexican love songs into the night.

Mary Wack remembered a man who wanted to be the university’s poet-in-residence, right down to writing a personal poem for every student who would receive an award.

And student after student, particularly Mexican-American students from towns like Toppenish and Zillah, recalled a mentor and role model who showed what they could be while encouraging them to never forget where they came from.

With candles, poetry and song, nearly 100 Washington State University students and faculty Wednesday night marched and gathered to remember all the things Ricardo Sanchez was.

A high school dropout who served two prison terms for robbery, Sanchez in the early ‘70s rose to become a leading exponent of Chicano poetry and the fight for dignity for all races. On Sunday, he died at the age of 54 in his native El Paso after a nine-month bout with cancer.

At WSU, where he taught since 1991, he carried the formal title of associate professor of English and Comparative American Cultures.

But in ceremonies held on the same day as Sanchez’s hometown funeral, speakers showed how hard it could be to describe the cut of his character.

A bearded bear of a man with fingers cloaked in turquoise-and-silver rings, he could discourse at length about racism and stop in his tracks to answer a question about poetry from a timid student like Jason Probst.

“Anybody who knows Ricardo probably knows I got a pretty detailed answer,” he recalled.

“There was a piece of Ricardo for everyone,” said Maureen McCarney, a political science doctoral candidate.

“It’s about inclusion,” she said as she marched toward Stadium Way, candle in hand. “Poetry is the most democratic of all the arts. All you need is a mind and a voice. Anyone can do it.”

In a gathering at St. Thomas More Catholic Student Chapel, a rosary and remarks frequently drifted in and out of Spanish, much as Sanchez’s poetry would flow from one language to another.

Felipe Duran, one of Sanchez’s closest friends, alluded repeatedly to Sanchez’s deep sense of both anger and humanity.

“He was very tender,” he said. “But nobody could put him down. Not even cancer could put him down.”

Duran wore a T-shirt with Sanchez’s face and the title Poetic Despedida, or poetic farewell. It marked Sanchez’s departure from El Paso for WSU in 1991, but took on a different meaning as the evening unfolded.

Reading from a poem he wrote upon hearing of Sanchez’s death, Duran said:

in your pain you told me

‘que buena es la vida, verdad?’ (how beautiful is life, true?)

si, compa, y por eso (yes, friend, and for that)

nuestra raza will survive (our people will survive)

and your life helped make it possible.

, DataTimes ILLUSTRATION: Photo