Arms Raised to a Sky Clear and Blue

I love all plants.

But my favorite one,

Is by far the saguaro.

Growing so slowly it could,

Be human generations before anyone,

Would even consider it,

A thing at which to marvel.

60 years before first flower.

100 years per arm.

Home only to those,

Small enough to dodge the spines.

They grow so glacially,

That cutting one down,

Is a jail-able offense.

Carnegiea gigantea.

On a hike in my late teens,

I saw one with 20 arms.

A cactus that could,

Be older than Christ.

Standing sentinel,

Arms outstretched,

To a sky,

Clear and blue.

Empty of gods, and monsters.

I stopped and thought about

This alien organism.

Living in the barren,

Waterless,

Waste.

To its long and slow life,

My age is one quarter of a flower.

My body puny by comparison.

If it stretched and bent,

To wrap its arms around me,

My skin would shred.

In even the most tender of

Embraces.

As I stood and pondered,

A blue-tailed grackle,

Perched upon the palms of this hulking plant.

Unbothered by the million knives,

Sprouting from its flesh.

It cocked its head to the side,

Regarding me with one eye.

As if to say:

"I have the sky,

I have the wind,

And this ancient,

Faceless,

Creature of flesh,

And passive defense,

The object of your human adoration,

Is mine to claim as well.

So walk on little human.

With your fragile flesh,

And breakable mind.

Walk on into your perception of time,

As linear,

Where this moment will be a thing of your past."

I obliged.

Humbled by the words,

This bird could never speak.

I took no pictures.

When one is faced,

With the greatest beauty,

One does not insult it.

To lay it bare and worthless,

With mimicry.

An object of such beauty,

Captured by photograph,

A human trick of light and mirrors.

Can only ever hope,

To be just pretty.