LOOM BLESSING

Thrums nor odds of thread
My hand never kept, nor shall keep,

Every colour in the bow of the shower
Has gone through my fingers beneath the cross,

White and black, red and madder,
Green, dark grey, and scarlet,

Blue, and roan, and colour of the sheep,
And never a particle of cloth was wanting.

I beseech calm Bride the generous,
I beseech mild Mary the loving,
I beseech Christ Jesu the humane,
That I may not die without them,
That I may not die without them.

 

The full volumes of the Carmina Gadelica collected by Alexander Carmichael can be read in English and Gaelic at www.smo.uhi.ac.uk/gaidhlig/corpus/Carmina