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.