Subject: Lyr Add: THE SHIFTING WHISPERING SANDS
From:
Jim Dixon
Date: 05 Feb 02 - 12:38 PM
I think what you see and hear at the Jim Reeves link above is only Part 1 of the song. The song was divided into Parts 1 and 2 to fit it on a 45-rpm record. Bill Sables, I'm guessing that's why you remember the Eamonn Andrews version as "having more of a story."
From a Dutch Jim Reeves fan site (I corrected some spelling.)
THE SHIFTING WHISPERING SANDS
M Gilbert; V Gilbert
(Recorded 21 March 1961)
(Spoken:)
I discovered the valley of the shifting, whispering sands while prospecting for gold in one of our western states. I saw the silent windmills, the crumbling water tanks, the bones of cattle and burros, picked clean by buzzards, bleached by the desert sun. I stumbled over a crumbling buckboard, nearly covered by the sands. And stopping to rest, I heard a tinkling, whispering sound, and suddenly realized that even though the wind was quiet, the sand did not lie still.
I seemed to be surrounded by a mystery so heavy and oppressive I could scarcely breathe. For days and weeks I wandered aimlessly in this valley, seeking answers to the many questions that raced through my fevered mind: "Where was everyone? Why the white bones? The dry wells? The barren valley where people must have lived and died?" Finally, I could go no farther. My food and water gone, I sat down and buried my face in my hands, and resting thus, I learned the secret of the shifting, whispering sands.
How I escaped from the valley I do not know; but now, to pay my final debt for being spared, I must tell you what I learned out there on the desert, so many years ago.
(Choir:)
When the day is hardly quiet, and the breeze seems not to blow,
One would think the sand was resting, but you'll find this is not so.
It is whisp'ring, softly whisp'ring, as it slowly moves along,
And for those who stop and listen, it will sing this mournful song:
Of sidewinders, and the horned toads of the thorny chaparral,
In the sunny days and moonlight nights, the coyote's lonely yell,
How the stars seem you could touch them, as you lay and gazed on high
At the heavens where we're hoping we'll be going when we die.
(Spoken:)
Yes, it always whispers to me, of the days of long ago,
When the settlers and the miners fought the crafty Navaho.
How the cattle roamed the valley, happy people worked the land--
And now, everything is covered by the shifting, whispering sands.
How the miner left his buckboard, went to work his claim that day,
And the burros broke their halters when they thought he'd gone to stay,
Wandered far in search of water, on, to Old Sidewinder's Well,
And there their bones picked clean by buzzards that were circling when they fell.
(Choir:)
How they found the aged miner, lying dead upon the sand -
And at once they could but wonder if he died by human hand...?
So they dug his grave and laid him on his back and crossed his hands,
And his secret still is hidden by the shifting, whispering sands.
(Spoken:)
This is what they whispered to me, on the quiet desert air;
Of the people, and the cattle, and the miner lying there.
If you want to learn their secret, wander through this quiet land,
And I'm sure you'll hear the story of the shifting, whispering sands.
(Choir:)
...of the shifting, whispering sands.
[Recorded by Rusty Draper, Sheb Wooley, Jim Reeves, Johnny Cash, the Sons of the Pioneers, and Eamonn Andrews.]
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