Inspired by the beauty of the Renaissance and the extravagance of Baroque art, this poetry collection delights in the splendors of the past with its descriptions of forgotten glories, remote places, and colorful meditations on unusual relics and marvels. Moving between different languages, continents, and time periods, the poems vary from recollections of the world of the 17th century to shorter sequences that view contemporary England through the eyes of a spy, to a group of elegies and epistles about the place and history of northern Scotland.