Iris.
The goddess of the rainbow, she was a messenger of the gods, expecially of Zeus and Hera.
—Classical Gods and Heroes, translated and edited by Rhoda A. Hendricks, 1974.
Lucifer.
The morning star. The name means “light-bearer” or “light-bringer.”
—Classical Gods and Heroes, translated and edited by Rhoda A. Hendricks, 1974.
Luna.
The Roman goddess of the moon; sometimes identified with the goddess Diana.
—Classical Gods and Heroes, translated and edited by Rhoda A. Hendricks, 1974.
Medusa.
A daughter of the sea deities Phorcys and Ceto. She was a monster with wings, snakes in place of hair, and the power to turn people to stone with her glance.
—Classical Gods and Heroes, translated and edited by Rhoda A. Hendricks, 1974.
Paros.
One of the Cyclades Islands. Parian marble was famous for its fine quality and whiteness.
—Classical Gods and Heroes, translated and edited by Rhoda A. Hendricks, 1974.
Phoebe.
Phoebus.
In later mythology Apollo had the epithet Phoebus, meaning “light” or “bright,” and was often identified with the sun god Helios.
—Classical Gods and Heroes, translated and edited by Rhoda A. Hendricks, 1974.
this rare sight
“Known in the weather world as a circumhorizontal arc, this rare sight was caught on film on June 3 as it hung over northern Idaho near the Washington State border.
The arc isn’t a rainbow in the traditional sense—it is caused by light passing through wispy, high-altitude cirrus clouds. The sight occurs only when the sun is very high in the sky (more than 58′ above the horizon). What’s more, the hexagonal ice crystals that make up cirrus clouds must be shaped like thick plates with their faces parallel to the ground.
When light enters through a vertical side face of such an ice crystal and leaves from the bottom face, it refracts, or bends, in the same way that light passes through a prism. If a cirrus’s crystals are aligned just right, the whole cloud lights up in a spectrum of colors.
This particular arc spanned several hundred square miles of sky and lasted for about an hour. . . .”
—Victoria Gilman for National Geographic, June 19, 2006.
black mud
“[They s]end bubbles to the surface of this ooze
As glancing roundabouts you may observe.
Fixed in the slime they say: ‘Sullen we were
In the sweet air cheered by the brightening sun
Because of sulky vapors in our hearts;
Now here in this black mud we curse our luck.’
This burden, though they cannot form in words,
They gurgle in their gullets”
—Dante Alighieri, The divine comedy, translated by Thomas G. Bergin, 1969.
Night Thoughts
“This is creation’s melancholy vault,
The vale funereal, the sad cypress gloom;
The land of apparitions, empty shades!
All, all on earth is shadow. . . .
This is the bud of being, this dim dawn,
The twilight of our day, the vestibule.”
—Edward Young, from Night Thoughts, 1741.