Lights in the Darkness

by Jonathan Shipley

photo by Jan Axelson

The Northern Lights over Cherokee Marsh are a beautiful experience.

“I have come into the world as a light,” reads John 12:46, “so that whoever believes in me may not remain in darkness.” In the Torah, it reads, “A little light chases away a lot of darkness.” The Qur’an: “O mankind! There has come to you a conclusive proof from the Lord, and we have sent down to you a clear light.” Buddha said, “From a tiny spark may burst a mighty flame.” In the Bhagavad Gita is this: “He is the light of all lights, beyond all darkness.” The Shinto has this Norito prayer: “Guide us with your bright and wondrous light, that our hearts may be pure and our path made clear.”

Menominee tradition is that the Aurora Borealis lights are torches held by friendly giants of the north, who use them as they fish at night. In some Algonquin traditions, the creator Nanobozho traveled north and built a large fire. The Aurora Borealis is the reflection of that fire, reminding the Algonquin people that the creator is still there with them in the dark, still lighting their way.

Yes, the Northern Lights over Cherokee Marsh are beautiful. I walk the paths, stumbling in the dark, looking up; always looking up to see that indescribable cosmic majesty.

It’s December, the holiday season, and the dark is now littered with glittering lights.

There are roughly ten recognized religious holidays in December. Back at home (it’s cold here at the marsh under these bare oaks), there’s a Christmas tree tinseled with joy next to the chimney pinned with stockings. Or there’s a menorah with little flickering candles. Some Decembers, at home, there’s Ramadan or Eid to celebrate. Hindus honor Vishnu’s victory over Murasura with Vaikuntha Ekadashi. Yule logs will be burned as pagans celebrate the winter solstice.

At Cherokee Marsh, deer quietly browse the frosted grass; cardinals flit amongst empty limbs; muskrats busy themselves under frozen ponds. All this, now, under this euphoria of light; these ethereal curtains of reds and blues and greens. I wonder what it’s like for those creatures as I get back into my car and huddle my hands around the dashboard’s little heater before driving off. What does a winter wren think in a shower of beauty? What must a mallard contemplate? A vole? A coyote might look up and howl a wild carol.

I drive back home, enter my warm house filled with the warmth of love: me, my wife, our children, thoughts of those we love who are not with us—mothers, fathers, siblings, friends—but with us just the same. Most certainly with us.

“Did you see them?” My wife asks of the lights.

Did I ever. The light of God, or gods, or no god at all, just electrically charged particles from the sun colliding with gases from Earth’s atmosphere. Maybe it’s just that, or maybe much, much more than that.

We are made of stars, and the sun is the star causing this radiating exultation. Yes, we are made of stars: ourselves, those we love, the browsing deer, the flitting cardinal, and the coyote singing its carols at the marsh. The light above everyone and everything dances its remarkable dance, reminding us that we know its rhythm.

Of course we do. All we must do is put a hand over the heart to know it. Hear it? Feel it? The mallard does. The vole does. The oaks, do, too, cloaked now in heaven’s garland.

Photo by Jonathan Shipley