Notes for the Cactus Poem

The teddy bear cholla and the fat fat • Oh buckthorn, devil, whipple, teddy bear • Oh beavertail, oh pancake, porcupine • Oh plump saguaro with your hairy arms, I love Each of you with a different nerve of heart. Especially you, so trim, so pert, your birds Cupped in your pits and crotches, little friends • Oh areoles and aureoles, the orioles With yellow caps are havering and hot Making themselves a breeze with their cut wings • I ask the docent and he indicates • Oh nation, how you might have been, spread from So sure an order, with such tendering love