Charles E. Burchfield, Journals, January 2, 1915

Last night the moon hazed by snow mist, was surrounded by a weird circle, the lower half of which was lost in the density of the horizon—seeming then like a rainbow, caused by moonlight striking snow!

Last night’s promise was fulfilled today in a wild spasmodic blizzard from out of the west. At morning the snow was thick and soggy, but hourly the wind cold until at darkness the snow was star-flakes.

Again I am reading the Rubaiyat of Omar Khayyam. And each time they grow more wonderful. After glympsing [sic] “The Greatest thing on Earth” they are doubly beautiful by contrast, like being transported from the soggy rainy day in the city, to a sun-shot morning in a woods.

—Charles E. Burchfield, Journals, January 2, 1915

[Omar Khayyham (1048-1131) was a poet, mathematician, philosopher, and astronomer who lived in Persia, now known as Iran.]