OCR Text |
Show NEVADA. BY MORTIMER WILSON. Lines written while crossing the desert. 0 Desertland, long wasted and abhorred, ab-horred, With endless scorn thy sands pile vile rebuke Upon our country's stern indifference! With scarce a mark upon thy visage plain, Save rock-strewn brush memento of , God 's wrath At Hell's formation rendezvous of snakes! Beneath thy sunburned bosom wealth entrails Thy bowels with gold! Thy limbs are staggering "" AVith orey weight a lie bespeaks thy face! Neglected f Aye, thy tears are lakes of salt, Poured molten years agone in beds streaked gray! Forgotten in thy sorrow barren born! Liko maid uncomely oft with Venus vies In charms revealed but to her chosen lord To master such as thee great kings havo killed! Thy sisters east and west and north and south Could spare thee blood, thy famished veins to fill; , Thy lost sterility to quick reclaim! Comes many a loveto woo thee in pretense, pre-tense, With fevered pulse, and lust. Soul-bond demand, Or else, thy secret-sweets shouldst them deny! Given promises to thee in selfish greed Bortcnd thy homely face to beautify; Base flattery tolls early knell. Beware! The grief thou hast long suffered goads thee blind; A Mecca in thy midst against God's y . law! Thou seest not its tents pitched deep in mire! 'Twere better even as Utah once ac-' ac-' claimed: Full many mates, allotted equally Than now abandon, yet elsewhere main-tain! main-tain! Kefroshed, thy erring sister breathes in health; Unbound, soul-free, long since hatb much achieved, Wjth light, as well with might, directs her scow! . Begenerate! A rose upon thy cheek 'Twere brought by vale and hill from lands afar In gorgeous beauty thus thou "It blossom blos-som fair! |