Touching the Moon

Hours ago, we were walking in Provincetown’s center. Raucous, crowded. Bicyclists weaving through pedestrians on Commercial Street. The Lobster Pot’s neon sign flashing bright. Drag queens in stiletto heels enticing folks to come see their shows. Owners walking with dogs of all sizes, bejeweled in tiaras, on rhinestone leashes; some sitting pertly, watching the crowds from baby strollers.

Now, with skies darkening, we stand alone on our deck. We’ve rented this special place for two weeks every year, for the past twenty-five years. A twenty-minute walk into town, it seems like a world away from all that we were in the midst of, just an hour ago. We listen to the silence around us. We watch with incredulity and awe as the sky darkens and a full orange-red gleaming orb rises. “Hold your hand, just there,” my husband tells me. He takes the photo. It’s the closest I’ll ever come to touching the moon.

civilization
believes itself so clever
full moon knows better

Frank is hosting haibun Monday at dVerse, the virtual pub for poets around the globe. We’re to write about the full moon. According to Frank, in February, the full moon is called the Snow Moon. I’ve taken the liberty of writing about an experience we had one September. I believe the full moon was called the Blood Moon at the time. Photos from two different years in Provincetown, Massachusetts, which is at the very tip end of Cape Cod.

I Should Have Listened

My girl, my girl, don’t lie to me.
Tell me, where did you sleep last night?
Beneath the willow tree?
Its branches so lithe, so low.
Its lance shaped, feather-veined leaves
brushing sensuously across your bloodied mouth?

They warned me:
if she floats then she is not
a witch like we had thought.
But your incandescent eyes beckoned me,
consumed my rationality.
And I learned, you are so much more.

Blackened sky, host to full moon.
I am bereft. Abandoned again.
Shrieking howls from God knows where,
scream the undeniable truth.
How much longer can I endure
these monthly night terrors?

My lust lit afire by your smooth body,
entwined with mine so often at evensong.
But this I fear, left once again.
I am slowly going insane
knowing you have never been,
nor will you ever be, all mine.

Written for Tuesday Poetics at dVerse, the virtual pub for poets around the globe.
Melissa is hosting and sharing information about the late singer, song-writer, Kurt Cobain. She asks us to consider several of his songs and use one or more lines from them, within a poem we post today. Image generated on Bing Create.

“My girl, my girl, don’t lie to me.
Tell me, where did you sleep last night?”
From Where Did You Sleep Last Night? / Songwriter: Huddie Ledbetter

“If she floats then she is not
A witch like we had thought.”
From Serve the Servants / Songwriter: Kurt Cobain