Classic and Contemporary Poetry: Explained

Gary Snyder’s "All Over the Dry Grasses" is a fragmented, sensory-rich meditation on environmental loss, human encroachment, and the lingering presence of the natural world within an increasingly industrialized landscape. The poem’s structure—brief, disjointed lines and an absence of conventional syntax—mirrors the dissonance between past and present, between the land’s organic history and its modern transformation.

The opening lines, "Motorburn, / oil sump dirt smell / brake / drum", immediately establish a contrast between the mechanical and the natural. These industrial images evoke the grime and pollution of modern transportation, disrupting the purity of the landscape. The juxtaposition of "once deer kisst, grazed, pranct, pisst, / all over / California." highlights the displacement of wildlife by human development. Snyder deliberately uses archaic spellings ("pranct") and compressed phrasing to evoke a sense of loss, as if even language itself is eroding under the weight of modernity.

As the poem moves forward, its images shift from past to present. The phrase "household laps. / gum tea / buds." suggests a domesticated life, where natural elements—tea, plants—exist within human structures rather than in the wild. The reference to "new houses, / found wed on block pie." signals suburban expansion, reducing the vast California landscape to partitioned plots. Snyder’s use of broken syntax forces the reader to reconstruct meaning, paralleling the way nature itself is fragmented by development.

The invocation of "sa."—potentially an abbreviation for Sangha (a Buddhist community) or a truncated exclamation—interrupts the poem’s flow, almost as if the poet is calling for attention or mourning a loss. The following plea, "bring back thick walls, (cools my poison, poison, / scorpio itch, tick—", suggests both a longing for traditional, insulating structures and an awareness of toxicity—physical, environmental, or spiritual. The reference to "scorpio itch, tick—" introduces a bodily discomfort that could symbolize human estrangement from nature or the consequences of unchecked expansion.

The poem concludes with an ethereal, dreamlike image: "dreaming of / babies / All over Mendocino County wrappt in wild iris leaves." Here, Snyder evokes a vision of rebirth, innocence, and a return to a more harmonious relationship with the land. The wild iris leaves recall indigenous and ancestral practices of wrapping newborns in natural materials, reinforcing the theme of nature as a cradle, a source of sustenance and belonging. Mendocino County, known for its rugged coastline and redwood forests, stands as a remnant of a wilder California—one that, in Snyder’s imagination, might still nurture future generations.

"All Over the Dry Grasses" captures Snyder’s persistent theme of ecological awareness through its juxtaposition of industrialization and wilderness. The poem resists linear progression, instead presenting a collage of impressions that reflect both destruction and the faint hope of renewal. By weaving together the harsh realities of urban expansion with images of deer, tea buds, and iris-wrapped babies, Snyder underscores the tension between a world that has been paved over and a deeper, older world that still lingers beneath.

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