Venice at Noonday

Past the Lido among the voices, bar of ending across

the morning, -

The shine of the channel and-the Adriatic laid like

quicksilver into the East

The curve and perspective of generations, the question

of men's minds and the gesture.

Out of the obscure festering of centuries, far over

water, direction of morning,

The silvered levels of a nameless surmise allured the

spirit to a wedding of light:

The future and the answer a chain of horizons, cities

and deserts, the cumulus of Asia.