The greatest tragedy that can befall us is to go unimagined.
—N. Scott Momaday
In this film, a reindeer girl hangs on in an incredible wind. In this film, my teacher tells my class about the Sami, Norway’s native peoples. In this film, sculptures of wood and fire line the edge of a lake and burn back history.
Shifting borders are lifted and lit. Suspended in the lit air: Norwegians, Finns, Russians.
Ice sculptures either make or undo themselves over candles. (The perspective is yours.) What isn’t yours— the designs of crepe paper, dipped in water, frozen.
In an incredible wind, a reindeer girl hangs on, and I’m imagining her breathing.
Dawn Tefft recently graduated from University of Wisconsin–Milwaukee with a Ph.D. in creative writing. Her poems appear in Fourteen Hills and Sentence among other journals. Her e-chapbook, Field Trip to My Mother and Other Exotic Locations, can be found at Mudlark. 
