Sunset light grazing a church roof, steeple, clouds and then reflecting off the moon

A Vast Illumination – My photograph of the year 2025

By Dave Powell

Just a glance at this vast illumination showed me how hard light has to hustle to deliver our individual realities.

Blasting along at 186,282 miles a second, rays from the sun setting behind me averaged just 8 minutes 22.6 seconds to cross the 93,478,000 miles needed to warm by back, then graze the church walls and roof, bathe its steeple, caress the clouds, streak on to the moon above, and finally, carry that celestial orb’s reflected glow back to my eyes and iPhone camera. And along the way, the sun’s rays also dropped off enough illumination for someone inside the dark church to find and flick switches for its electric lamps.

All in under 9 minutes.

Nothing in this existence works harder than light. The bringer of much experience.

–Dave Powell is a Westford, Mass., writer and avid amateur photographer.

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About The Author

By Dave Powell
Trained in mathematics, physics, computer programming and science journalism. Retired mathematician, award-winning technical and journalistic writer. Past winner of an international business-journalism equivalent of the Pulitzer Prize. And past author and editorial advisor for Sesame Street... where I regularly worked with Jim Henson and Kermit! Now enjoying "retirement studies" of photography, quantum physics and "scientific spirituality." (And restoring a shamefully lapsed relationship with the piano.)
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