Don Emblen

Santa Rosa Junior College will celebrate the life and poetry of storied English instructor Don Emblen at a memorial gathering at 2 p.m. Sunday in Newman Auditorium on the main campus.

Emblen, Sonoma County’s first poet laureate, died at his longtime Santa Rosa home on April 24. He was 90.

SRJC is hosting the celebration of Emblen’s life. The Los Angeles native and World War II Navy veteran joined the English Department in 1959 and soon became an intellectual magnet and mentor.

Emblen honored the written word and infected generations of students with his love of honest, observant composition. He wrote poetry nearly daily, routinely presenting a colleague or friend with a poem he’d been inspired to write by some occasion, large or small, in the life of that person.

Most of the speakers at Sunday’s celebration will include in their tributes a personal favorite poem of Emblen’s. Those speakers will include Terry Ehret, a fellow former Sonoma County poet laureate, and friend Gaye LeBaron, the history author and Press Democrat columnist.

There will be live music and two singers — retired Sonoma County Court Commissioner Jeanne Buckley and Placido Garcia, a vineyard foreman and member of the Calistoga City Council — will perform vocal tributes to their friend the poet.

Emblen retired from SRJC in 1988 and was named the county’s first poet laureate in 1999. He is survived by his wife, Linda Emblen of Santa Rosa, daughters Cirre Emblen of Sacramento and Clovis Emblen Scarpaci of Woodland Hills and by two grandchildren.