ON the mountain side they fashion,
Those rifting shreds of storm,
A figure of strange passion,
A winged and sworded form.
Majestic, wild, colossal,
With angry arm thrown high;
Those swaying shoulders jostle
The glory from the sky.
Then flows the happy hour.
That tyrant of the mist
Turns to a wavering tower
And melts in amethyst,
Foretelling thus the cycle
— O speed it, Holy Dove!—
When the Archangel Michael
Shall vanish into Love.
Katharine Lee Bates
