the winter anthology
Vol. 13
Maggie Nelson
from Bluets: 162
According to Dionysius, the Divine Darkness appears dark only because it is so dazzlingly bright—a paradox I have attempted to understand by looking directly at the sun and noticing the dark spot that flowers at its center. But as compelling as this paradox, or this experiment, may be, I am not as interested in it as I am in the fact that in Christian iconography, this “dazzling darkness” appears with startling regularity as blue.