I want to write about the moon.
It’s been demanding attention the last two days fully exposing itself on my drive home and then sneaking through the tiny slit in my bedroom blinds to blind me in it’s brilliance.
I have to admit I was a bit worried. Wednesday my ninth graders were in fine full moon form so I was expecting a pack of wackadoodle werewolves yesterday.
But, they were freakishly good. Maybe it was me who was lupine like.
A full moon is really quite spectacular. Sometimes it looks so close it seems you could easily reach out, delicately pluck it out of the sky and place it in your pocket.
There is some wonderful “moon” imagery in literature. One of my favourites is from Earl Birney’s poem “David” where a“peek was upthrust. /Like a fist in a frozen ocean of rock that swirled/ Into valleys the moon could be rolled in”. The big old boulder of a moon rolling in a valley like a ball in a pinball machine.
Maycomb in “To Kill a Mockingbird” has “lady in the moon…She sat at a dresser combing her hair.” I tried looking for her yesterday as I sat at a red light. She must have wandered off because I couldn’t find her.
Emily Dickenson “watched the Moon around the House/Until upon a Pane – /She stopped- a Traveller’s privilege- for Rest”. The moon last night didn’t just stop upon a pane, she pressed her nose against it and stared at me as I tried to sleep. He obtuseness was a tad creepy.
If the moon is full where you are tonight, go out and gaze up at her in wonder.
Appreciate her brash brilliance
and write a verse or two.
I dare you.
Ink And Spine 