He looks around
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e l’ occhio riposato intorno mossi, dritto levato, e fiso riguardai per conoscer lo loco dov’ io fossi.
I moved my rested eye around, and, risen upright, gazed intently to make out the place where I was.
Rested and upright, he studies the place to learn where he stands.
The fear of the last canto is gone; the eye is <i>riposato</i>, rested, and the pilgrim can look. Dante's first act on the new shore is not to flee but to study — to fix the place before feeling it.
It is a scientist's gesture as much as a traveler's. Throughout the poem, understanding comes from careful looking, and here the looking is deliberate and slow, an eye turned steadily on the dark to learn its shape.
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