Lorine Niedecker
Darwin
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 Fe
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 Galapagos 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 was most ridiculous
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'
from Darwin, I-V
Lorine Niedecker, Collected Works, ed. Jenny Penberthy, University of California Press, 2002.