Tucson Brush Strokes
By Don Iannone

Nothing hides the searing hot sun
at noon in June in Tucson,
where the maize-colored desert sand
befriends the olive-green sagebrush,
and the gangly octopus-armed saguaro
stretch lazily in powder blue sky,
and where ragged dull gray-green mountains
cradle you in their powerful arms,
while the old pueblo sleeping inside you
slowly melts back into its original abode.