The Cloisters: The sure Covenant

Let the storms ply their deep and threatening bass,
The Bow of Promise shall the shades illume,
Brightly descried in Faith's eternal glass,
E'en like an Angel's many-colour'd plume
Waving in tempest — pledge that in her bloom
Nature, emerging from the stormy mass,
Will keep her time and order, — Let them pass,
The wicked and their plottings : mid the gloom,
The Church surveys her Covenant sign, and smiles.
And 'neath her solemn rainbow's dripping arch,
A mystic wing spread o'er her daring march,
She goes forth, on her heavenly work the whiles,
Though weeping, sure that One in joy shall bring
Her and her sheaves at harvest-moon to sing.