Brautigan's poem: Anti-technology or Pro-technology?

 Brautigan's poem has an anti-technology tone and message due to his usages of images, similes, and diction. Even though Brautigan starts off his poem with the images of a "cybernetic meadow where mammals and computers live together in mutually programming harmony" (3-6), the poem goes on to mention a "cybernetic ecology where we are free from our labors and joined back to nature, returned to our mammal brothers and sisters" (19-23) suggesting that due to the advancement of technology, humans will soon loose their jobs and be thrown into nature with no way of survival. The poem then compares mammals and computers, saying that they are like "pure water touching clear sky" (7-8). This is just an attempt to put the two together, yet we all know that the" pure water" can never touch the "clear sky" suggesting that humans can never fit together with technology. And with the other simile in lines 15-16 the poem, it is suggested that technology is of no importance. Technology will eventually be forgotten. And from the use of "I like to think" (1), it is suggesting that what is being thought may never happen, so trying to put technology and humans together is impossible. And when it says "all watched over by machines of loving grace" (24-25), there is the meaning that humans depend too much on technology that they're even putting technology at a higher level and in some ways has become some sort of god and that shouldn't be how it is.

Brautigan also uses images, similes, and diction to argue that the poem has a pro-technology tone and message. In lines 3-6, he is suggesting that it's all right for mammals and computers to live together. And as the poem goes on to talk about "our labors" in lines 20-23, it is saying that because of technology, we are able to enjoy life more, or more specifically nature. We are able to relax and not have to worry about anything, for technology will have it all covered for us. We will be "free of our labors," not having any worries. And in the simile in lines 7-8, there is a sense of blending. As for the other simile in lines 15-16, it is saying that technology doesn't matter and that it can go with human life. And with this, there is the author's choice of adding in the phrases in the parentheses, showing to the reader that it should be a world where technology and humans work together. Plus, the machines are portrayed as having "loving grace" (25), telling us that technology is something that we should all care about.

With these two arguments, the anti-technology seems to be more convincing. This is because of the words choice that Brautigan uses. They don't seem to go together. "Cybernetic" doesn't go with either "meadow," "forest", or "ecology." And, machines can't be explained containing "loving grace." "Pure water" can't touch the "clear sky." Brautigan is putting things together that don't belong together, furthering the idea that humans shouldn't live together with technology; therefore the anti-technology tone and message.

But Brautigan leaves us to define for ourselves which one is better, leaving his poem full of ambiguity.