THE CATHEDRAL

The streaming glitter of the avenue, The jewelled women holding parasols, The lathered horses fretting at delay, The customary afternoon blockade, The babel and the babble, the brilliant show— And then the dusky quiet of the nave. The pillared space, an organ strain that throbs Mysteriously somewhere, a rainbow shaft Shed from a saint's robe, powdering the spectral air, A workman with hard hands who bows his head, And there before the shrine of Virgin Mary A lonely servant girl who kneels and sobs.