“A Light In the Black” is the final song in Rainbow’s second album , Rising.

It concludes the epic story introduced in “Stargazer”. The slaves find it hard to believe that after following the wizard for many years, building a tower from which he could fly and reach the stars, he lies dead on the sand. They can’t find any immediate purpose to their lives, they don’t know what to do with their freedom. Finally, there can be two interpretations about the end of the story.

A. The “light in the black” symbolized hope where there shouldn’t be any. The slaves all realize they are free to go back to their homes, from which they were absent almost a lifetime.

B. Since they were already living under harsh conditions, they finally died shortly after the wizard. The light in the black could symbolize that after all they went through, they managed to find eternal life up in the sky, like some kind of heaven. This is backed up by the fact that the narrator says “I found my way back home, to the sky” and then he remarks that he can now see the star the wizard wanted to reach, possibly from up close, if he’s really dead.