Santa Ana Wind

Jacaranda trees bloom with purpled flowers in the spring, generally. Kochia is the only weed that is resistant to pesticides,
So if by some rare dream, if by some sorcery the human race were to vanish from the earth In rapture The housing bubble might pop once and for all and

Without weed-whackers
And men flipping real estate, renovating old adobe homes to look more like new, bright Mallorca pads sleek white Spanish modern with white stucco walls and small windows and
clay tiled roofs
kochia would pop up through the cracks in the sidewalk first
Then common thistle might grab hold of thine statuette of Saint Francis of Assisi by the shoulders and pull him down into the
Russian knapweed obnoxious weeds
And grass over

Without a sickle
And no fence to keep coyotes out
You might just forget that anyone ever lived there in fact
The chaparral friends would move in:
Dalmatian toadflax, mustard flower, lemonade berry, toyon, purple needlegrass, beyond midnight, elderberry, manzanita, mesquite, bush monkey, taboose, chia, moss verbena, dipladenia, bird of paradise, hibiscus
Drought-tolerant California natives
Bust through the A frame skinny and hungry and a little bit wild

I do not think that the rose bush would thrive without us to curate its hedge, though its thorns provide ample protection from hungry predators

And yes, the American flag
Would haggard too
Faded in the sun
Tarnished by the wind

Before long “Best to buy a house in december!”
Things without names
Would arrive through the cut earth Angled windows bent in, western growers lecture on the worm
Without your own perennial Eyes of the World
You’d be surprised by the beauty in the topology Of things falling apart And barbie dolls might be thought of as our idols to fertility goddesses
And our televisions religious altars

And finally our angry, arrogant atheism victim to a more sobering nature Could I count on

you, upright creature, like I count on the wind to bring about this restoration?