<html><head><meta http-equiv="content-type" content="text/html; charset=utf-8"></head><body style="overflow-wrap: break-word; -webkit-nbsp-mode: space; line-break: after-white-space;"><div dir="auto" style="overflow-wrap: break-word; -webkit-nbsp-mode: space; line-break: after-white-space;"><p style="margin: 0px 0px 20px; font-style: normal; font-variant-caps: normal; font-stretch: normal; line-height: normal; font-size-adjust: none; font-kerning: auto; font-variant-alternates: normal; font-variant-ligatures: normal; font-variant-numeric: normal; font-variant-east-asian: normal; font-variant-position: normal; font-variant-emoji: normal; font-feature-settings: normal; font-optical-sizing: auto; font-variation-settings: normal; background-color: rgb(255, 255, 255);"><span style="font-kerning: none">Why California Will Never Be Like Tuscany</span></p><p style="margin: 0px 0px 20px; font-style: normal; font-variant-caps: normal; font-stretch: normal; line-height: normal; font-size-adjust: none; font-kerning: auto; font-variant-alternates: normal; font-variant-ligatures: normal; font-variant-numeric: normal; font-variant-east-asian: normal; font-variant-position: normal; font-variant-emoji: normal; font-feature-settings: normal; font-optical-sizing: auto; font-variation-settings: normal;"><span style="font-kerning: none; background-color: #ffffff">There must have been huge oaks and pines, cedars,</span><span style="font-kerning: none"><br>
</span><span style="font-kerning: none; background-color: #ffffff"> maybe madrone,</span><span style="font-kerning: none"><br>
</span><span style="font-kerning: none; background-color: #ffffff">in Tuscany and Umbria long ago.</span><span style="font-kerning: none"><br>
</span><span style="font-kerning: none; background-color: #ffffff">A few centuries after wood was gone, they began to build with</span><span style="font-kerning: none"><br>
</span><span style="font-kerning: none; background-color: #ffffff"> brick and stone.</span></p><p style="margin: 0px 0px 20px; font-style: normal; font-variant-caps: normal; font-stretch: normal; line-height: normal; font-size-adjust: none; font-kerning: auto; font-variant-alternates: normal; font-variant-ligatures: normal; font-variant-numeric: normal; font-variant-east-asian: normal; font-variant-position: normal; font-variant-emoji: normal; font-feature-settings: normal; font-optical-sizing: auto; font-variation-settings: normal;"><span style="font-kerning: none; background-color: #ffffff">Brick and stone farmhouses, solid, fireproof,</span><span style="font-kerning: none"><br>
</span><span style="font-kerning: none; background-color: #ffffff">steel shutters and doors.</span></p><p style="margin: 0px 0px 20px; font-style: normal; font-variant-caps: normal; font-stretch: normal; line-height: normal; font-size-adjust: none; font-kerning: auto; font-variant-alternates: normal; font-variant-ligatures: normal; font-variant-numeric: normal; font-variant-east-asian: normal; font-variant-position: normal; font-variant-emoji: normal; font-feature-settings: normal; font-optical-sizing: auto; font-variation-settings: normal;"><span style="font-kerning: none; background-color: #ffffff">But farming changed.</span><span style="font-kerning: none"><br>
</span><span style="font-kerning: none; background-color: #ffffff">60,000 vacant solid fireproof Italian farmhouses</span><span style="font-kerning: none"><br>
</span><span style="font-kerning: none; background-color: #ffffff">on the market in 1970,</span><span style="font-kerning: none"><br>
</span><span style="font-kerning: none; background-color: #ffffff">scattered across the land.</span></p><p style="margin: 0px 0px 20px; font-style: normal; font-variant-caps: normal; font-stretch: normal; line-height: normal; font-size-adjust: none; font-kerning: auto; font-variant-alternates: normal; font-variant-ligatures: normal; font-variant-numeric: normal; font-variant-east-asian: normal; font-variant-position: normal; font-variant-emoji: normal; font-feature-settings: normal; font-optical-sizing: auto; font-variation-settings: normal;"><span style="font-kerning: none; background-color: #ffffff">Sixty thousand affluent foreigners,</span><span style="font-kerning: none"><br>
</span><span style="font-kerning: none; background-color: #ffffff">to fix them, learn to cook, and write a book.</span></p><p style="margin: 0px 0px 20px; font-style: normal; font-variant-caps: normal; font-stretch: normal; line-height: normal; font-size-adjust: none; font-kerning: auto; font-variant-alternates: normal; font-variant-ligatures: normal; font-variant-numeric: normal; font-variant-east-asian: normal; font-variant-position: normal; font-variant-emoji: normal; font-feature-settings: normal; font-optical-sizing: auto; font-variation-settings: normal;"><span style="font-kerning: none; background-color: #ffffff">But in California, houses all are wood —</span><span style="font-kerning: none"><br>
</span><span style="font-kerning: none; background-color: #ffffff">roads pushed through, sewers dug, lines laid underground —</span><span style="font-kerning: none"><br>
</span><span style="font-kerning: none; background-color: #ffffff">hundreds of thousands, made of strandboard, sheetrock,</span><span style="font-kerning: none"><br>
</span><span style="font-kerning: none; background-color: #ffffff"> plaster —.</span></p><p style="margin: 0px 0px 20px; font-style: normal; font-variant-caps: normal; font-stretch: normal; line-height: normal; font-size-adjust: none; font-kerning: auto; font-variant-alternates: normal; font-variant-ligatures: normal; font-variant-numeric: normal; font-variant-east-asian: normal; font-variant-position: normal; font-variant-emoji: normal; font-feature-settings: normal; font-optical-sizing: auto; font-variation-settings: normal;"><span style="font-kerning: none; background-color: #ffffff">They won’t be here 200 years from now — they’ll burn or rot.</span><span style="font-kerning: none"><br>
</span><span style="font-kerning: none; background-color: #ffffff">No handsome solid second homes for</span></p><p style="margin: 0px 0px 20px; font-style: normal; font-variant-caps: normal; font-stretch: normal; line-height: normal; font-size-adjust: none; font-kerning: auto; font-variant-alternates: normal; font-variant-ligatures: normal; font-variant-numeric: normal; font-variant-east-asian: normal; font-variant-position: normal; font-variant-emoji: normal; font-feature-settings: normal; font-optical-sizing: auto; font-variation-settings: normal;"><span style="font-kerning: none; background-color: #ffffff">Thousand-year later wealthy</span><span style="font-kerning: none"><br>
</span><span style="font-kerning: none; background-color: #ffffff">Melanesian or Eskimo artists and writers here,</span></p><p style="margin: 0px 0px 20px; font-style: normal; font-variant-caps: normal; font-stretch: normal; line-height: normal; font-size-adjust: none; font-kerning: auto; font-variant-alternates: normal; font-variant-ligatures: normal; font-variant-numeric: normal; font-variant-east-asian: normal; font-variant-position: normal; font-variant-emoji: normal; font-feature-settings: normal; font-optical-sizing: auto; font-variation-settings: normal; background-color: rgb(255, 255, 255);"><span style="font-kerning: none">— oak and pine will soon return.</span></p><div style="margin: 0px; font-style: normal; font-variant-caps: normal; font-stretch: normal; line-height: normal; font-size-adjust: none; font-kerning: auto; font-variant-alternates: normal; font-variant-ligatures: normal; font-variant-numeric: normal; font-variant-east-asian: normal; font-variant-position: normal; font-feature-settings: normal; font-optical-sizing: auto; font-variation-settings: normal; min-height: 22px;"><span style="font-kerning: none"></span><br></div><div style="margin: 0px; font-style: normal; font-variant-caps: normal; font-stretch: normal; line-height: normal; font-size-adjust: none; font-kerning: auto; font-variant-alternates: normal; font-variant-ligatures: normal; font-variant-numeric: normal; font-variant-east-asian: normal; font-variant-position: normal; font-feature-settings: normal; font-optical-sizing: auto; font-variation-settings: normal;"><span style="font-kerning: none"><span class="Apple-tab-span" style="white-space:pre"> </span>- Gary Snyder</span></div></div></body></html>