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I Hear Charles Darwin Sobbing Softly in His Grave

Barry G. Gale

I
Lyell gave me time,
Uniformitarianism process,
The Beagleoccasion,
And the Galapagos the theory.

Simple logic
formed the rest;
The argument
Irrefutable, I thought;
The conclusion, too:
Intelligent Design was
No design at all.

II
Nature provides
Evidence only evolution
can explain;
Anomalies which the
Creationist view
Cannot fathom;
Peculiarities which
An all-knowing
Intelligence would
Never create.

Thus instructs the geologic record;
Thus reveals the geographic
Distribution of organisms
In space and in time;
Thus morphology argues;
Thus embryology confirms.

The fine line between
Varieties and species?
Incipient species is the
Obvious answer,
Evolution the obvious tool.

Natura non facit saltum.
Nature makes no leaps.
Nature’s shibboleth.
Self-evident to most,
Still inscrutable to others.
What have people been thinking
These past 150 years?

III
Poor Kansas.
Pray for its people,
Especially its children.
Robbed of the precious
Distinction between
Faith and fact.
A distinction that
Ennobles religion,
Though school boards
Wouldn’t know that.

Realize now how
Lucky Dorothy was
For her brief reprieve.
Can imagination succeed
Where backwardness prevails?

I am not without
Sensibility or understanding.
Aware it is
Useless to reason
With emotion,
Fruitless to argue
With what others believe
Is pre-ordained.
The solution is simple:
Belief is why churches are built,
And sermons are sung on Sundays.

IV
Myth and illusion
Die slowly,
If at all.
Ignorance is a
Sticky substance,
Not easily cleansed
From the rational mind.

Those that would harness
Nature with Religion’s
Painful yoke,
Take a lesson from
History:
Galileo demurred but
His ideas did not.

Though thousands may
Be silenced by prejudice,
Fear and hate,
Science gains its power
By growing knowledge,
Not by one man’s fate.

I seek a modern Huxley:
Decisive, courageous, resolute.
Teach the lessons once again.
Teach the housewife and
The farmer;
Teach the butcher and
The beggar;
Teach the children growing up;
Teach the weary growing old;
Teach the lame and
Teach the nimble.

Read in Nature
Not what others say,
But what
Nature itself reveals
Yesterday, tomorrow,
And today.

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This appears in a pre-2010 issue of Down in the Dirt magazine. Saddle-stitched issues are no longer printed, but you can requesting it “re-released” through amazon sale as a 6" x 9" ISBN# book! Email us for re-release to order.

This appears in a pre-2010 issue
of Down in the Dirt magazine.
Saddle-stitched issues are no longer
printed, but you can requesting it
“re-released” through amazon sale
as a 6" x 9" ISBN# book!
Email us for re-release to order.