It looks like a shadow of something,
maybe a hand with a cloth
trying to wipe out
an unbearable brightness
from our eyes,
or the curve and feathered breast
of a bird lifting.
I understand how frightening
it must have been
a thousand years ago
to see the moon smudged away,
a soft, inexorable disappearance
like dementia taking the light
from behind the eyes of a friend,
or the sighing end of things
when earth or you or me
gets in the way
of seeing our way home
a lunacy.
But this giving back
of moonshine wiped clean
of all the tears,
the flying of a shadow to roost
in another orbit
around someone else’s love
is inexorable, too,
hope’s revelation,
the greater beauty of light
after an extinguishing.
“The greater beauty of light after an extinguishing”.
Nature again is teaching text. Thank you.
Nice, nice poem! I love the “lunacy” and how it plays off of “lunar” without you directly saying so. Good work!
Love this!