Jul 26, 2026 · 38 min · 10 segments
In this episode, Daniel Smith shares his poetic journey rooted in farming life, his influences like poet Gary Snyder, and the importance of capturing fleeting moments through poetry. We explore how…
He was part of the Beat Generation and a prominent, prominent poet in America.
And so for Daniel to have that experience of connecting with Gary Snyder, and so many of Daniel Smith's poems have this amazing, amazing connection to the land.
I'm really glad that we got Daniel Smith's discussion of how he got into poetry.
Well, and the idea that if you don't write something down, nobody's going to remember this and all this work that got put into this that really kept America and the world alive, you know.
And while we're talking, Evan, I'm reading, I'd never read before, Willie Cather's book, My Antonia.
It's terrific, and it's about farmers, farming, and the very hard life, Nebraska, Kansas, many years ago, and it's a day-in, day-out relating of life in a farming community a long time ago.
Hard work, of course, needing to break up the soil with an old-fashioned plow.
So tell us again how you connected with A rather famous poet, as we just described while you were away, Gary Snyder.
So I was very fortunate when Gary was brought to a community college near the farm in the 1990s to give a talk and a reading.
And Gary Snyder was the biggest influence on my writing and the way I saw the world.
My motivation to be a poet was the hope that someday somebody would read something I wrote and felt the way that I felt when I read Gary Snyder.
So as you can imagine, gentlemen, when you have somebody in that high esteem, when you suddenly host them for three days and you've never met them before, you're a little nervous.
But of course, Gary being Gary was the same wonderful, humble person interested, kind man in person that I knew him to be through his writing.
He was part of the Beat Generation and a prominent, prominent poet in America.
And so for Daniel to have that experience of connecting with Gary Snyder, and so many of Daniel Smith's poems have this amazing, amazing connection to the land.
I'm really glad that we got Daniel Smith's discussion of how he got into poetry.
Well, and the idea that if you don't write something down, nobody's going to remember this and all this work that got put into this that really kept America and the world alive, you know.
And while we're talking, Evan, I'm reading, I'd never read before, Willie Cather's book, My Antonia.
It's terrific, and it's about farmers, farming, and the very hard life, Nebraska, Kansas, many years ago, and it's a day-in, day-out relating of life in a farming community a long time ago.
Hard work, of course, needing to break up the soil with an old-fashioned plow.
So tell us again how you connected with A rather famous poet, as we just described while you were away, Gary Snyder.
So I was very fortunate when Gary was brought to a community college near the farm in the 1990s to give a talk and a reading.
And Gary Snyder was the biggest influence on my writing and the way I saw the world.
My motivation to be a poet was the hope that someday somebody would read something I wrote and felt the way that I felt when I read Gary Snyder.
So as you can imagine, gentlemen, when you have somebody in that high esteem, when you suddenly host them for three days and you've never met them before, you're a little nervous.
But of course, Gary being Gary was the same wonderful, humble person interested, kind man in person that I knew him to be through his writing.
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