Profulgent adj. Brilliant; shining forth.
"Profulgent" is an uncommon word that describes something shining brightly or radiantly. It evokes a sense of brilliance and splendor, suggesting an intense and dazzling glow.
Its rarity adds a touch of elegance and sophistication to descriptions, making it a word that can beautifully capture the luminosity of various phenomena, from celestial bodies to metaphorical brilliance in art or literature.
"Light is the first of painters."
- Ralph Waldo Emerson, “Nature” (1836)
Some early 20th-century astronomers jokingly used profulgent to describe stars so brilliantly bright that they seemed to “shine forward” into the future — as if their light were impatient to be seen.
A profulgent glow was rising as the sunlight touched the field,
A brightly shining entrance that the early hours revealed;
It drifted over grasses in a calm and steady flow,
A forward-shining motion from the quiet morning glow.