[APPLAUSE]
I've asked poet and artist Eric Magrane
to introduce tonight's reader.
Eric has taught several poetry and ecology
classes for the Poetry Center.
And in November he and Wendy Burk
are going to lead a two day workshop called
Poetry Goes For a Hike.
So sign up for that.
He's also the editor of Spiral Orb, an online experiment
in permaculture poetics.
Ask him about that later.
Please welcome, Eric Magrane.
[LAUGHTER]
I'd like to say a brief word about Gary Snyder and time.
In his essay Entering the 50th Millennium,
he writes about viewing cave art of the Upper Paleolithic.
In doing so, he rethinks our various cultural calendars
and places us today within the 50th Millennium
in a Homo sapiens calendar.
In this calendar he suggests and I'll quote from him here,
"a diachronic view in which we extend our tolerance back
in time taking a sympathetic open and respectful attitude
toward the peoples of the deep past."
Then he wonders what images our voices will carry to the people
10,000 years hence.
This push to extend our relationship with time
is not just a poetic exercise.
It makes sense.
In a recent book of essays, Back on the Fire Snyder
pushes for 1,000 year forest plan taking into account
the role of fire ecology.
In a present when short sightedness is the norm
we would do well to listen.
If we do, we may just have a chance
for the Homo sapiens calendar to press on
beyond another 10,000 years.
So here we are in the postmodern Holocene
looking out 10,000 years in either direction
in our Homo sapiens calendar, celebrating
50 years of the Poetry Center with the reading by Gary Snyder
tonight.
As I'm sure you all know, Gary Snyder
is a writer, a Buddhist and a bio- regionalist.
He was born in San Francisco in 1930
and is the author of 18 books of poetry and prose
including Turtle Island which won the Pulitzer Prize in 1975.
Mountains and Rivers Without End which
won the Bollingen prize in 1997 and the influential book
of essays The Practice of the Wild.
He has been a logger, a forest fighter, a lookout,
a professor, and a zen student in Japan.
He lives in the Northern Sierra of California.
Tonight, he'll read his own work as well as
reminisce about his friendship with Poetry Center's founder
Ruth Stefan.
One of my favorite poems is Snyder's poem
"The Canyon Wren" that's part witness and part
elegy for a river.
And it takes place on a trip down the Stanislaus river
before it was dammed.
The poem rests on the song of the Canyon Wren, which
Snyder directly quotes.
And I'll quote Snyder quoting "The Canyon Wren."
Titi, ti ti ti ti ti.
The poem then reaches back close to 1,000 years to pull
in quotes from Buddhist masters Su Tung P'o and Dogen.
The Canyon wren in being directly quoted is given
as much respect as the two human poets.
The poem ends with the following lines,
these songs that are here and gone, here and gone
to purify our ears.
Many songs are in conversation within each other.
Within and across time through the window of Snyder's work.
Ladies and gentlemen, here tonight
to help clarify our ears please welcome Gary Snyder.
[APPLAUSE]