‘FABRICS OF ENCHANTMENT PILED TO HEAVEN’

I rode one evening with Count Maddalo

Upon the bank of land which breaks the flow

Of Adria towards Venice: a bare strand

Of hillocks, heaped from ever-shifting sand,

Matted with thistles and amphibious weeds,

Such as from earth’s embrace the salt ooze breeds,

Is this; an uninhabited seaside,

Which the lone fisher, when his nets are dried,

Abandons; and no other object breaks