Tumbleweeds would bounce along like forward passes

in dusty, Texas high school stadia.

And they could piggyback

around your blue jeans during desert pee breaks.

Rebarbative and prickly snowdrifts.

They cling together and to the fence wire.

Better to be a wide receiver or a tight end?

Anthropocene precursors of plastic,

self-adhering grocery bags and global warming.

Other invasive species I recall were

tamarix, scotch thistle and Texans themselves.

Silt and seeds from Pampa and Borger blew past Raton

to ebb and spill in piñon trees farther west.

Cowboy genes scatter away to spanish west—

So long, its been good to know yuh.

Arthur Rothstein

Wikipedia

Tumbleweeds were symbols of the dust bowl and dust storms, and big disseminators of seeds. To me they symbolized Texas culture creeping west and corrupting us all.