---
title: Improvement Era
description: Monthly periodical of the Mormon church, 1897 onward. This library holds the issues of November 1897 to December 1930.
authors:
  - Spencer, Josephine
collections:
  - periodicals
tags:
  - magazine
  - improvement-era
periodical: Improvement Era
volume: 10
number: 4
published: 1907-02
publisher: Young Men’s Mutual Improvement Associations
publisher_place: Salt Lake City
language: en
type: magazine
reference: 'Spencer, Josephine, "Utah: A Poem," *Improvement Era* 10, no. 4 (February 1907): 304.'
source:
  url: https://archive.org/details/improvementera1004unse
  transcription: Transcribed from the Internet Archive scan of each issue (the item for each issue is named in the issue's own source); unnumbered advertising leaves are omitted, printed page numbers are kept as page markers.
  identifier: improvementera1004unse
start_page: 304
end_page: 304
rights:
  status: public-domain
  basis: US publication 1930 or earlier (published 1907-02)
  source: https://archive.org/details/improvementera1004unse
  publication_year: 1907
  note: The Internet Archive item metadata carries a blanket "© Copyright by Intellectual Reserve, Inc." notice. The library owner judged it inapplicable because this issue was published in 1907, before 1931; a scan-level notice does not restore copyright.
---

# Utah: A Poem

<!-- page:304 -->

804 IMPROVEMENT ERA.
Oh, well do I remember
What peace and love so fair
Awoke in me while hearing
The angels singing there;
For all the choir of angels
Sang wondrous praise and prayer.
They sang a song of Priesthood
Again to earth restored,
—
A song of songs so joyful
In praise of One adored:
I knew the choir of angels
Was singing of our Lord.
And then I greatly marreled
That Priesthood was their theme;
To me the word awakened
A half- remembered dream
Of life among the angels.
Recalled by faith's bright gleam
That memory I treasured
As years went fleeting by;
I sought and found the Priesthood,
And knew the reason why
The chorus of the angels
Wad sent me from on high!
Salt Lake City,

<!-- page:304 -->

Utah.
And oft is mem'ry singing
Again those words of cheer
I heard in happy childhood,
With faith so fair and clear,
—
The dear, sweet song of angels,
With heaven's love so near.
J. L. TOWNSEND.
UTAH.
if or the Improvement Era )
There is a valley in the West,
Set like a gem amid the hills
—
The wealth of empires in its breast,
The light of freedom on its sills.
High on the crest of circling peaks
The silver of eternal snows
A flashing signal ever speaks
However green its vesture shows.
Land where the light of golden suns
Mellows the golden bud& of Spring!
Where Summer long her season runs
To steal the plumes from Winter's
wing.
Where armies of the golden corn
March acre square in tasseled ranks.
And the wheat's beared sheaves are
borne
By meadow bars and river banks.
Salt Lake City, Utah.
Land of the rippling, inland sea,
Rimmed with its low, salt-crusted
shores, —
Whose moods of deep or silver key
Intone their music at thy doors;
Of fertile plains, still to the dream
Of sage and sego keeping pledge
—
Which yet with fruitful fields shall teem
From mountain slope to salt sea edge.
Land of a thousand peerless gifts
!
Theme for the ages' minstrelsy
—
The voice of loyal peoples lift
A song of fervent praise to thee!
Sweet peace her olive sprays shall leave
On paths thy mounting steps must
tread;
And the far reaching years shall weave
Chaplets of laurel for thy head.
Josephine Spencer