Glory Tour (Spiritual Journey Thursday)

Last moon of 2017 (photo ©Dec. 31, 2017 by V. Nesdoly)

Welcome to Spiritual Journey (first) Thursday, February edition. Today we’re moodling on the moon.

To tell you the truth, I don’t have much of a relationship with the moon. It’s beautiful, for sure. I do love to see it bulge orange and bountiful over the horizon on a clear evening. I associate moonrises with autumn on the prairie, the thrum of combines and trucks in the background, my dad and uncle taking advantage of every bit of light to gather in the harvest of wheat and oats. But most of the time I feel sorry for the moon staring distant, cold, and lone into the night.

Of course the moon’s prominence, cool beauty, and mystery are impossible to miss. One of my favourite childhood poems was about the moon. You probably know it:

“Slowly silently now the moon
Walks the night in her silver shoon;
This way and that she peers and sees
Silver fruit upon silver trees;”

Read the rest of “Silver” by Walter de la Mare HERE.

It’s not surprising that the moon has been a worship object in many religions (and probably still is). Its waxing, waning, and connection to tides and seasons surely invest it with mysterious power that is only reinforced by the occasional eclipse. I love the poem “Lunar Eclipse (June 1928)” by D. S. Martin (a poem from his chapbook So the Moon Would Not Be Swallowed—a collection of poems inspired by correspondence from his grandparents who were missionaries in China). In it, he describes the reaction of the Chinese people to the lunar eclipse in June of 1928:

LUNAR ECLIPSE (JUNE 1928)
Yencheng, Honan, China

On Sunday
evening as darkness crept in
the people rushed out
with gongs
& pots
& anything to make noise
to scare
the heavenly dog
that slowly
very
slowly
ever so slowly
had
placed its jaws about the moon

Read the rest of D.S. Martin’s poem HERE…

My attitude toward the moon has been influenced by my Christian faith and the Bible, which depicts it as one of God’s creations. I love how Genesis describes its beginnings:

“Then God made two great lights: the greater light to rule the day, and the lesser light to rule the night” – Genesis 1:16 (emphasis added).

My poem today was inspired by Psalm 19 (where the moon isn’t mentioned specifically, but we know it is a part of the created heavens).

“The heavens declare the glory of God
And the firmament shows His handiwork.” – Psalm 19:1

Glory Tour

“God’s glory is on tour in the skies …
unspoken truth is spoken everywhere” – Psalm 19:1,4 The Message

The stars are reciting
galaxies rhyming
the language of eons
in speed-of-light timing.

The Sun’s dialect
of dangerous rays
is inflected with angles
defining our days.

The Moon serenades
tide, lover and season
chanting its charms
with quarterly reason.

The Heavens are dancing
Truth, Beauty and Wisdom.
The tickets are free,
Earth attendees are welcome!

© 2017 by Violet Nesdoly (All Rights Reserved)

(Glory Tour was first published on Laurel Archer’s 2017 Advent blog.)

Be sure to visit our Spiritual Journey First Thursday hostess, Donna at Mainely Write for links to more moon meditations.

 

Full Moon Almanac

Full Moon Almanac

Wolf Moon
lights snow-blue fields
embossed with paw print trails
to where January ghosts howl
Ice Moon

Snow Moon
February’s
bluster winds heap white dunes
We’ve stocked the cupboard full against
Storm Moon

Worm Moon
March’s wiggly
trails of melt, then Crust Moon
Spring so white and pure we call her
Chaste Moon

Pink Moon
wild flowers bloom
as April birds return
to build twig nest, lay a sky blue
Egg Moon

Flower
Moon of May
Bunnies hop in Hare Moon
Farmers dream Planting Corn Moon and
Milk Moon

Rose Moon
Strawberry Moon
of June when hard green fruits
soften, blush under sun’s rays, night’s
Hot Moon

Buck Moon
July’s the time
to hunt, replenish stores
then sleep secure through Thunder Moon
Hay Moon

Red Moon
August’s smoky
skies color Sturgeon Moon
while green Corn Moon sprouts, promises
Grain Moon

Harvest
Moon, September
lights nights of bringing in
oats and wheat under Barley Moon
Corn Moon

Hunter’s
Moon, roam under
October’s Travelers
Moon, stalk prey in frosty Dying
Grass Moon

Beaver
Moon, the busy
rodents mend their dams in
icy blue November’s grip of
Frost Moon

Cold Moon
lights Christmas paths
December’s carollers
so bright you could forget it’s Long
Night Moon

Blue Moon
rare-month moon
when full moons multiply
their charm, mystery, magnetism
My Moon

– Violet Nesdoly

***************

The November 2nd Poem-A-Day prompt was to write a full moon poem. I know there’s a lot of interesting lore about moons—full moons in particular. So I went hunting for some before I wrote my poem. My favorite find was a wonderful National Geographic article called “Full Moon: What’s in a Name?” It listed names the full moon has been called in lore and history through the months of the year, and gave the genesis of many of these names.

I wrote the poem in cinquain form (a 2-4-6-8-2 syllable cinquain) to keep myself reined in and the poem compact—seeing as how it would go on for 13 stanzas in any case.

This poem is submitted to Poetry Friday, hosted today by kidlit maven Anastasia Suen at Book Talking.