was born in a brick farmhouse in Lancaster Mass,he walked through the woods one...

was born in a brick farmhouse in Lancaster Mass,
he walked through the woods one winter
crunching through the shinycrusted snow
stumbling into a little dell where a warm spring was
and found the grass green and weeds sprouting
and skunk cabbage pushing up a potent thumb,
He went home and sat by the stove and read Struggle for Existence Origin of Species Natural
Selection that wasn't what they taught in church,
so ceased to believe moved to Lunenburg,
found a seedball in a potato plant
sowed the seed and cashed in on 's Natural Selection
on and with the Burbank potato.
Young man go west; went to Santa Rosa
full of his dream of green grass in winter ever-
blooming flowers ever-
bearing berries; could cash in on Natural Selection carried his apocalyptic dream of green grass in winter
and seedless berries and stoneless plums and thornless roses brambles cactus-
winters were bleak in that bleak
brick farmhouse in bleak Massachusetts-
out to sunny Santa Rosa;
and he was a sunny old man
where roses bloomed all year
everblooming everbearing
hybrids.
America was hybrid
America could cash in on Natural Selection.
He was an infidel he believed in and Natural
Selection and the influence of the mighty dead
and a good firm shipper's fruit
suitable for canning.
He was one of the grand old men until the churches
and the congregations
got wind that he was an infidel and believed
in . had never a thought of evil,
selected improved hybrids for America
those sunny years in Santa Rosa.
But he brushed down a wasp's nest that time;
he wouldn't give up and Natural Selection
and they stung him and he died
puzzled.
They buried him under a cedartree.
His favorite photograph
was of a little tot
standing beside a bed of hybrid
everblooming double Shasta daisies
with never a thought of evil
And Mount Shasta
in the background, used to be a volcano
but they don't have volcanos
any more.