Wickerman of the Desert

Saguaro are the typical, tall cactus, you know. Green and slim, with the whimsical arms. When they die, they leave their skeletons in place. Clusters of long vascular tubes stand in place while the vegetable matter sloughs away, like a loose suit of clothes.

The commonalities of design are obvious. While the bones of other mammals litter the desert in scattered designs, these bones remain upright for a time, eerily holding the shape of the creatures the saguaro once were. Their skeletons are tubes that carried and stored water. Then incidentally provided structure. The white bones of animals echo the same structure, now equally waterless, dry as the empty arroyos.

The lush groves of prickly pear leave nothing so dramatic. Their corpses are nothing more than collapsed balloons, dessicated amoebae awaiting the return of the inland oceans.

Wickerman waves good-bye.