The Black and the Blue

Multitude of the skies,

golden riddle of millions of stars,

cold, distant, lustrous, beautiful,

silent, unfeeling, unwelcoming.

Fulness of knowledge is their course,

emptiness of chartless ignorance,

a universe moving in silence,

a mind alone in its bounds.

Not they moved my thoughts,

not the marvel of their chill course;

to us there is no miracle but love,

lighting of a universe in the kindling of your face.

Sorley Maclean, Multitude