--- title: Improvement Era description: Monthly periodical of the Mormon church, 1897 onward. This library holds the issues of November 1897 to December 1930. authors: - Nelson, Lowry collections: - periodicals tags: - magazine - improvement-era periodical: Improvement Era volume: 20 number: 7 published: 1917-05 publisher: Young Men’s Mutual Improvement Associations publisher_place: Salt Lake City language: en type: magazine reference: 'Lowry Nelson, "The Desert Wind," *Improvement Era* 20, no. 7 (May 1917): 625.' source: url: https://archive.org/details/improvementera2007unse 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: improvementera2007unse start_page: 625 end_page: 625 rights: status: public-domain basis: US publication 1930 or earlier (published 1917-05) source: https://archive.org/details/improvementera2007unse publication_year: 1917 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 1917, before 1931; a scan-level notice does not restore copyright. --- # The Desert Wind Desert Wind Messenger of the wasting sand, Fiend and sculptor and artist, Companion, builder, destroyer, Of the melancholy desert land ! Lorn caves and dim, cryptic caverns, Hollowed by thy ceaseless toil, Are homes of the weird, wild phantoms, That sweep o'er the desert soil. Bridges — colossal, majestic, Carved by perennial blast, Spanning the queer-cut canyons, Age-stained, precipitous, vast; Joining a wilderness of pain To one of illusioned respite, For the crossing of perishing nomads, Lured on by mirages of sight; Rude statues and shapes fantastic, In that lifeless museum grand, Were fashioned, shaped and sculptured By thy wild erratic hand. The temples, gracing that empire Of sun-scorched, shifting soil, Sublime in their designless art, Are products of thy whirling toil. Here play the lights and the shadows; "Weird phantom and vanishing sprite Flit frantically, silently, in and out Then hasten to haunts of the night. Thy burden, the grains of the desert, Gathered on thy weariless way, With glory illumines the sunrise, And makes splendid the close of the day. Lowry Nelson.