(A Drunk Man Looks At Throbbing Thistle part 29)

O rootless thistle through the warld that’s pairt o’ you,
Gin you’d withstand the agonies still to come,
You maun send roots doon to the deeps unkent,
Fer deeper than it’s possible for ocht to gang,
Savin’ the human soul,
Deeper than God himsel’ has knowledge o’,
Whaur lichtnin’s canna probe that cleave the warld,
Whaur only in the entire dark there’s founts o’ strength
Eternity’s poisoned draps can never file,
And muckle roots thicken, deef to bobbies’ feet.

A mony-brainchin’ candelabra fills
The lift and’s lowin’ wi’ the stars;
The Octopus Creation is is wallopin’
In coontless faddoms o’ a nameless sea.
I am the candelabra, and burn
My endless candles to an Unkent God.
I am the mind and meanin’ o’ the octopus
That thraws its empty airms through a’ th’ Inane.

And a’ the bizzin’ suns ha’e bigged
Their kaims upon the surface o’ the sea.
My lips may feast for ever, but my guts
Ken naething o’ the Food o’ Gods.

“Let there be Licht,” said God, and there was
A little: but He lacked the poo’er
To licht up mair than pairt o’ space at aince,
And there is lots o’ darkness that’s the same
As gin He’d never spoken
—Mair darkness than there’s licht,
And dwarfin’t to a candle-flame,
A spalin’ candle that’ll sune gang oot.
—Darkness comes closer to us than the licht,
And is oor natural element. We peer oot frae’t
Like cat’s een bleezin’ in a goustrous nicht
(Whaur there is nocht to find but stars
That look like ither cats’ een),
Like cat’s een, and there is nocht to find
Savin’ we turn them in upon oorsels;
Cats canna.

Darkness is wi’ us a’ the time, and Licht
But veesits pairt o’ us, the wee-est pairt
Frae time to time on a short day atween twa nichts.
Nae licht is thrawn on them by ony licht.
Licht thraws nae licht upon itsel’;
But in the darkness them wha’s een
Nae fleetin’ lichts ha’e dazzled and deceived
Find qualities o’ licht, keener than ony licht,
Keen and abidin’;
That show the nicht unto itsel’,
And syne the licht,
That queer extension o’ the dark,
That seems a separate and a different thing,
And, seemin’ sae, has lang confused the dark,
And set it at cross-purposes wi’ itsel’.

see also:

A Drunk Man Looks At Throbbing Thistle (part 5)

A Reckless History Of Scottish Poetry