| Augustin S. Macdonald, comp. A Collection of Verse by California Poets. 1914. | | | | To the Colorado Desert | | By Madge Morris Wagner |
| | | THOU brown, bare-breasted, voiceless mystery, | |
| Hot sphinx of nature, cactus-crowned, what hast thou done? | |
| Unclothed and mute as when the groans of chaos turned | |
| Thy naked burning bosom to the sun. | |
| The mountain silences have speech, the rivers sing. | 5 |
| Thou answerest never unto anything. | |
| Pink-throated lizards pant in thy slim shade; | |
| The horned toad runs rustling in the heat; | |
| The shadowy gray coyote, born afraid, | |
| Steals to some brackish spring and laps, and prowls | 10 |
| Away, and howls and howls and howls and howls, | |
| Until the solitude is shaken with an added loneliness. | |
| Thy sharp mescal shoots up a giant stalk, | |
| Its century of yearning, to the sunburnt skies, | |
| And drips rare honey from the lips | 15 |
| Of yellow waxen flowers, and dies. | |
| Some lengthwise sun-dried shapes with feet and hands | |
| And thirsty mouths pressed on the sweltering sands, | |
| Mark here and there a gruesome graveless spot | |
| Where some one drank thy scorching hotness, and is not. | 20 |
| God must have made thee in his anger, and forgot. | | | | |
|
|
