The poems in Evolution of the Genus Iris respond to details, events, and emanations from the real, physical world and its species, humans and all the rest.
Robert Michael Pyle writes essay, poetry, and fiction from an old Swedish farmstead along a tributary of the Lower Columbia River in southwestern Washington. His sixteen books include Wintergreen and The Tangled Bank. A Guggenheim Fellow, he has received the John Burroughs Medal and several other writing awards. Pyle’s poems have appeared in magazines including the North American Review, and in a chapbook, Letting the Flies Out. Evolution of the Genus Iris is his first full-length book of poems.
"Robert Michael Pyle's voice is an essential element in the culture of our literary and scientific community. His deep knowledge of the ecology of the earth and the life patterns of a wide variety of living forms, his careful attention to detail, his passion and energy and commitment to humanity that appear in his past work are present in abundance throughout the poetry in Evolution of the Genus Iris. We are fortunate readers indeed to have this new book and its poems abroad in the world."
– Pattiann Rogers
"How wonderful to have one of our best lepidopterists and nature writers turn assuredly to poetry. Robert Michael Pyle has a scientist's precise eye, the earthy experience of a field biologist, the vast knowledge and lexicon of a scholar, and the sensibility and wisdom of a very fine poet. We feel an immediate intimacy with the plants and animals he recreates. Pyle loves the living world – as savage as it is – and in poem after wonderful poem he offers the natural promise of beauty and renewal. I felt enlightened and healed by this book."
– Henry Hughes