By The Mouth Of The Arno

Here, where the crawling river seaward sets, And riverward the sea, about a land Laid under heaven in lonely flats of sand Saltblackened, where the sluggish water frets Its margin till marsh-deltas interlace In reedy desolation; on each hand The long gray grasses shiver in their grace Through sun and shadow, till salt winds deface, Their wasted beauty; here--by such a strand-- Pale Shelley passed, and so his course did keep To sail Death’s unexplored and open deep.

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