.
You, darkness, of whom I am born -
.
I love you more than the flame
that limits the world
to the circle it illumines
and excludes all the rest
.
But the dark embraces everything:
shapes and shadows, creatures and me,
people, nations - just as they are.
.
It lets me imagine
a great presence stirring beside me.
.
I believe in the night.
.
~ Rainer Maria Rilke
from The Book of Monastic Life, I,11
.