Quotes from Gary Snyder

I don't know of any other city where you can walk through so many culturally diverse neighborhoods, and you're never out of sight of the wild hills. Nature is very close here.

Three-fourths of philosophy and literature is the talk of people trying to convince themselves that they really like the cage they were tricked into entering.

Will be but corpses dressed in frocks, who cannot speak to birds or rocks.

Poetry a riprap on the slick rock of metaphysics

Walking is the great adventure, the first meditation, a practice of heartiness and soul primary to humankind. Walking is the exact balance beween spirit and humility.

A great poet does not express his or her self; he expresses all of our selves.

I try to hold both history and wilderness in mind, that my poems may the true measure of things and stand against the unbalance and ignorance of our times.

Place and the scale of space must be measured against our bodies and their capabilities.

Find your place on the planet. Dig in, and take responsibility from there.

I thought, that day I started, I sure would hate to do this all my life, And dammit, that's just what I've gone and done.

There are those who love to get dirty and fix things. They drink coffee at dawn, beer after work. And those who stay clean, just appreciate things. At breakfast they have milk and juice at night. There are those who do both, they drink tea.

Clambering up the Cold Mountain path, The Cold Mountain trail goes on and on: The long gorge choked with scree and boulders, The wide creek, the mist-blurred grass. The moss is slippery, though there's been no rain The pine sings, but there's no wind. Who can leap the world's ties And sit with me among the white clouds?

Clouds sink down the hills Coffee is hot again. The dog Turns and turns about, stops and sleeps.

Switchback turn, turn, and again, hard scrabble steep travel ahead.

True affluence is not needing anything.

On Climbing the Sierra Mountains again after 31 years Range after range of mountains Year after year after year. I am still in love.

When men see Han-shan They all say he's crazy And not much to look at - Dressed in rags and hides. They don't get what I say And I don't talk their language. All I can say to those I meet: Try and make it to Cold Mountain.

Great Brown Bear is walking with us, Salmon swimming upstream with us, as we stroll a city street.

I could almost love you again.

Deer love mushrooms.

I'm sixty-eight" he said, "I first bucked hay when I was seventeen. I thought, that day I started, I sure would hate to do this all my life. And dammit, that's just what I've gone and done.

I wanted a good place to settle: Cold Mountain would be safe. Light wind in a hidden pine - Listen close - the sound gets better. Under it a gray haired man Mumbles along reading Huang and Lao. For ten years I havn't gone back home I've even forgotten the way by which I came.

All those years and their moments— Crackling bacon, slamming car doors, Poems tried out on friends, Will be one more archive, One more shaky text.

the man who has the soul of the wolf knows the self-restraint of the wolf