when winter darkness is the norm, any amount of light upon fallen snow starkly separates dark shadow and glittering glow, shifting and dodging as the source moves, compromising its utility for much more than just a few feet of view at one time. Unless the source is very high in the sky – such as this waxing wolf moon of 2026, first full moon of the year and the last of a cycle of four supermoons that began in 2025 – here generating broad swaths of blue and green hues through ice crystals in the atmosphere while casting slow-moving shadows behind cradled moonlight across the laden boughs of the forest.