Radiant, without & within

The light is so fantastic. The ice hides a million prisms in the rivers and tides of the country. For three hours after dinner I slog into streams and across hillsides to find ice forming so I can dance lights through the frozen architecture, red and blue, and whatever it is they call white, bounced off silver or grey light discs. I need four hands for all the flashlights; one of them is mounted on my head, one is in my mouth (luckily the wind slumbers), and during the 15 seconds of exposure I perform a small routine perched on rocks slippery with fresh glaze; one of my shoes is soaked from stepping into the arctic waters earlier today, and I can vouch that wool does indeed keep you warm when wet; the squish in every step is ominous, though, and now I sit with hot chocolate and tingling toes, radiant from without and within. These bulbs of ice are formed by flecks of spray. They are beautiful jewelry; nature's liquid adornments. Sometimes I think they are better to shoot than the aurora; but the borealis was out on New Year's Eve, flexing its energies, but for twenty minutes only and then a mushy turquoise melt. The glimpse is tantalizing, and the ice reflects our ambitions in its shards of light; there seems to be every color, all hues, except for the northern light of phosphorescent green.