Darwin

D

Lorine Niedecker

Lorine Niedecker

I

His holy

slowly

mulled over

matter

not all “delirium

of delight”

as were the forests

of Brazil

“Species are not

(it is like confessing

a murder)

immutable”

He was often becalmed

in this Port Desire by illness

or rested from species

at billiard table

As to Man

“I believe Man…

in the same predicament

with other animals”

II

Cordilleras to climb—Andean

peaks “tossed about

like the crust

of a broken pie”

Icy wind

Higher, harder

Chileans advised eat onions

for shortness of breath

Heavy on him:

Andes miners carried up

great loads—not allowed

to stop for breath

Fossil bones near Santa Fé

Spider-bite-scauld

Fever

Tended by an old woman

“Dear Susan…

I am ravenous

for the sound

of the pianoforte”

III

FitzRoy blinked—

sea-shells on mountain tops!

The laws of change

rode the seas

without the good captain

who could not concede

land could rise from the sea

until—before his eyes

earthquake—

Talcahuana Bay drained out—

all-water wall

up from the ocean

—six seconds—

demolished the town

The will of god?

Let us pray

And now the Galápagos Islands—

hideous black lava

The shore so hot

it burned their feet

through their boots

Reptile life

Melville here later

said the chief sound was a hiss

A thousand turtle monsters

drive together to the water

Blood-bright crabs hunt ticks

on lizards’ backs

Flightless cormorants

Cold-sea creatures—

penguins, seals

here in tropical waters

Hell for FitzRoy

but for Darwin Paradise Puzzle

with the jig-saw gists

beginning to fit

IV

Years… balancing

probabilities

I am ill, he said

and books are slow work

Studied pigeons

barnacles, earthworms

Extracted seeds

from bird dung

Brought home Drosera—

saw insects trapped

by its tentacles—the fact

that a plant should secrete

an acid acutely akin

to the digestive fluid

of an animal! Years

till he published

He wrote Lyell: Don’t forget

to send me the carcass

of your half-bred African cat

should it die

V

I remember, he said

those tropical nights at sea—

we sat and talked

on the booms

Tierra del Fuego’s

shining glaciers translucent

blue clear down

(almost) to the indigo sea

(By the way Carlyle

thought it most ridiculous

that anyone should care

whether a glacier

moved a little quicker

or a little slower

or moved at all)

Darwin

sailed out

of Good success Bay

to carcass-

conclusions—

the universe

not built by brute force

but designed by laws

The details left

to the working of chance

“Let each man hope

and believe

what he can”

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