In the pink light,

    haloes of cloud form over the mountains;

    lightning, two valleys away,

    then, not an hour later,

    the explosion of thunder.

    The roadrunners

    pecking for breadcrumbs on the porch

    have long since fled into the rabbitbrush,

    into the endless ocean of grass.

    Driving in every direction

    down licks of red road, I have lost

    myself in a militarized topography;

    everything named after army units,

    generals, scouts, miners…

    The Dragoon Mountains,

    Cochise Stronghold; defunct

    Gleeson and Pearce,

    weird, rusty ghost towns, the only

    non-derelict structure

    for miles, the local school,

    its polished windows and well-kept lawn,

    a source of great local pride.

    No mountain monograms

    for these desiccated whistle-stops,

    no giant Q or C or W in bright

    white paint to mark

    the township''s still functional

    sorta functional breathing, no

    carving for them

    into the planet''s bark;

    and thus they are blesséd

    to me like no other;

    every successful city

    is a flimsy affair with civility,

    its eternalness, like Paris or Rome,

    mere hypocrisy.

    MAKE AMERICA GREAT AGAIN,

    BUY REAL ESTATE! Hail follows rain.

    Nearby, the township of Sunsites,

    once billed as the safest

    spot to survive

    the inevitable nuclear winter,

    actually topped Soviet Russia''s

    list of high-priority targets… Enter

    the Orange Duck Candidate.

    A haboob sweeps across

    the Valley of the Senile.

    In a week, the mountains

    have switched from brown

    to purple to green.

    The desert is human

    endeavour''s most fitting graveyard;

    the slow bleaching,

    the gradual eroding into sand,

    the heat stifling sound as it leaps into the air.

    IT CAN''T HAPPEN HERE. But it always does.

    By André Naffis-Sahely