Lawns are for fools and cowards. 

That’s what I say. And maybe you disagree—

maybe you are not as Californian as I am.

Maybe you have not seen the Earth split

like lips too chapped for bleeding, 

have not watched the sky glow

like a Martian sunrise.

I say, let all the lawns die—

it’s the grass or us, or perhaps

it’s only the grass or me.

Me, and the red and white salvia (“Hot Lips,” indeed).

Me, and the dusty yellow yarrow.

Me, and the firm blue spires of the catmint.

Only me—and all the other messy, hardy plants

who put down roots in the earth’s wounds. 

Tonight, I am the bachelor’s button whose sunny blue

the summer has not yet diminished. 

I am the scarlet flax, 

brilliant as a solar flare.

No weeping pansy, me, tonight I

am the Corsican violet,

indomitable, intransigent and unyielding. 

I am each of these (incomprehensible) wildflowers 

who, even if she be parched,

will still sing out 

to the milk-throned monarch,

to the gold-winged swallowtail,

even to the hummingbird, with his opal-feathered heart:

Come, my love.

Draw nearer.