Become Desert
After John Luther Adams’s musical composition Become Desert
Jordan Rodriguez
In the botanical garden at UC Riverside
where rose blossoms are framed by smog
a scrub jay flies down the mountain
and perches on the palos verde
to survey so marvelous a garden
we cultivate here
little bird, tell the roses I’m sorry
for the smog
and tell the roses I breathe it too
though I’m more culpable, you’d agree
but if we should suddenly fade away
into the grit beneath the chaparral
this garden too would return to desert
and the roses would wilt
you would keep the highways and warehouses
now bearing Amazon and Walmart
but cars like the one I drove
to come here would stop
and then I think you would have
the last laugh
I’m sure new growth would overtake the old,
and if you found yourself among the new
your song would ring out just the same
limitless over the roofs of our world
Jordan Rodriguez is a high school English teacher in San Leandro, CA. His writing has been published in About Place Journal, Tule Review, Inlandia, and Occam’s Razor.


© Variant Literature Inc 2021