“This City now doth like a garment wearThe beauty of the morning; silent, bare,Ships, towers, domes, theatres and temples lieOpen unto the fields and to the sky;All bright and glittering in the smokeless air.”

“Upon Westminster BridgeEarth has not anything to show more fair: Dull would he be of soul who could pass by A sight so touching in its majesty: This City now doth, like a garment, wear The beauty of the morning; silent, bare, Ships, towers, domes, theatres, and temples lie Open unto the fields, and to the sky; All bright and glittering in the smokeless air. Never did sun more beautifully steep In his first splendour, valley, rock, or hill; Ne'er saw I, never felt, a calm so deep! The river glideth at his own sweet will: Dear God! the very houses seem asleep; And all that mighty heart is lying still!”

“Back above ground, like robotic versions of the mosques and minarets that grace the shores of Istanbul's Bosphorus, Houston’s petroscape of domed white tanks and silver fractioning towers spreads along the banks of its Ship Channel.”

“Orcs, and talking trees, and leagues of grass, and galloping riders, and glittering caves, and white towers and golden halls, and battles, and tall ships sailing, all these passed before Sam's mind.”

“I am the daughter of Earth and Water,And the nursling of the Sky;I pass through the pores of the ocean and shores;I change, but I cannot die.For after the rain when with never a stainThe pavilion of Heaven is bare,And the winds and sunbeams with their convex gleamsBuild up the blue dome of air,I silently laugh at my own cenotaph,And out of the caverns of rain,Like a child from the womb, like a ghost from the tomb,I arise and unbuild it again.”

“Billions of hard, bright stars shone with relentless glitter across the tropic night sky.”