A lightful day

Saint Lucy's day concert (Globen Luciakonsert)

At dawn on 13th December in Sweden thousands of young girls, dressed in white gowns, holding a lit candle and with a crown of electric candles on a wreath on their heads, bring light to the darkness of Swedish winter.

This is the "Lucia Festival", a 400 year-old tradition, played out in churches, schools, hospitals and workplaces around the country. Saint Lucy's day is so important that Christmas would not be Christmas in Scandinavia without it.

Fear of the dark

I am the man who walks alone

And when I'm walking a dark road
At night or strolling through the park

When the light begins to change
I sometimes feel a little strange
A little anxious when it's dark

Fear of the dark, fear of the dark
I have constant fear that something's

always near
Fear of the dark, fear of the dark
I have a phobia that someone's
always there

Fear Of The Dark is the title track of 1992 album by Iron Maiden, like most of their songs, bassist Steve Harris, was released as a single in the live version taken from A Real Live One and recorded during their concert in Helsinki on August 27, 1992. It 'was the twenty-sixth single released by the band and reached the fifth of the UK charts (remember that the song is metal).

There's a line between light and dark

Carrie Newcomer (born May 25, 1958) is an American singer and songwriter. In the album "Geography of light" (2008), she explores the impalpable experiences we have in our lives. Like the nature of light, these experiences can't be perceived by the sense of touch.

A lot of the "Geography of Light" is about trying to put into language and music all those things we experience and recognize, that have no language. I mean, how many words do we have to try to describe the quality of light? Glow, beam, shimmer, radiate…. It’s about navigating that shadow and light in our lives, and all those gray spaces in between. There aren’t any easy answers – but there’s a lot of good questions. (From a Carrie Newcomer's interview about her album).

The song "A Map of Shadows" originated as an essay describing an experience of watching the night become morning:
Well well well - it's so hard to tell .
There's a line between light and dark,
Between heaven and hell.
Well well well - it's not easy to see.
What's out there on my left or right,
Or what's right in front of me.

Lady in the dark

Our lady of the hospital

"Our lady of the hospital", by Harrison Millard (1830-1895), it's a song from American Civil War music (1861-1865).

The lady sitting in the dark between the hospital tents, is illuminated by the light of a lamp. The dark represents the sad days of the Civil War, the light and the lady simbolize the pity for the soldiers.

  She sits in our long dark ward
  By the light of a shaded lamp,
  No sound but the cry of relieving guard
  And the sentinels’ heavy tramp

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