A Nevada Desert

An aching, blinding, barren, endless plain,
Corpse-colored with white mould of alkali,
Hairy with sage-brush, slimy after rain,
Burnt with the sky’s hot scorn, and still again
Sullenly burning back against the sky.

Dull green, dull brown, dull purple, and dull gray,
The hard earth white with ages of despair,
Slow-crawling, turbid streams where dead reeds sway,
Low wall of sombre mountains far away,
And sickly steam of geysers on the air.