Revontulet
Revontulet is the Finnish word for “Foxfire,” also for the Northern Lights
The night we saw the Northern Lights
here in Seattle, it was raining iguanas
in Florida, snowing in Mobile.
So, why not, the tails of spirit foxes, as the Finnish
believed, calling the aurora “foxfire.”
My ancestors, Appalachians in the Smoky Mountains,
called the green fire that appeared in the forest
by the same name. Foxfire, Fire foxes, the sparks
from tails in the sky, green and purple
or the fingers of some God, reaching out to us
in the cold quiet of a winter night,
when we are on the lookout for a sign.
Jeannine Hall Gailey is a writer with multiple sclerosis who served as the second Poet Laureate of Redmond, Washington. She’s the author of six books of poetry, including Field Guide to the End of the World, winner of the Moon City Book Prize, and Flare, Corona (BOA Editions), which was a finalist for the Washington State Book Awards. She has a B.S. in Biology and M.A. in English from the University of Cincinnati and an MFA from Pacific University. Her work appeared in American Poetry Review, Salon, Ploughshares, and Poetry. For more information, visit www.webbish6.com.
