Anyone who knows me - even a little bit - knows I detest heat, sand, and barren land. Give me cool days, cold nights, forests, and lakes - all shades of blue and green, with spring flowers, autumn leaves, and winter snows thrown in for extra flavor. In light of these facts, how I ever wound up at the University of Arizona in Tucson remains a mystery. Yet it happened. I arrived on an August day when the temperature topped out at 115 degrees. A temperature which recurred day after day with little variance for more than a month. Even the nights hovered near the 100 degree mark. I lasted exactly one semester, which ironically ended with a freak snowstorm in December - the first in forty years.
There are many people who rhapsodize about the beauty of the desert. They seem otherwise sane. Today’s poem is a bit about that.
DESERTING THE DESERT
Smart scorpions hide in my shoes
taking a break from the unrelenting
sun and lung-searing heat while
tarantulas scuttle atop furry legs
across sand during days so hot
the silica should melt and nights
so cold your snot could freeze.
More shades of brown than a
color-wheel brandishes
paint this place of beige flatlands
stretching past the horizon
interrupted only by bumps of sienna rocks —
the only relief an occasional
saguaro or jumping cactus
lending its whisper of green, and
sporadic lava rocks black as death
thrown asunder, random as rolled dice,
aged evidence of the violence
that birthed this hellish place.
”Come to the desert,“ they said.
”It is beautiful,” they said.
Hi Kathleen. You couldn’t be more correct. Desert is boring landscape with brief interruptions. Seasons bring a kaleidoscope of changing colors.
No desert for me. Need seasons to experience all types of weather.