Message of the Moon

by John Herlihy

What is the message of the moon,

But the waxing of its days.

What is the symbol of the moon,

But the inscrutable waning of its ways.

A message we every night encounter,

In its nightly passage across the sky.

Stars rained down as from a fountain,

We gaze into the night sky with a sigh.

The moon waxing large with its borrowed light,

Across the vast wreckage of its ravaged face.

Without the moon night wouldn't be truly night,

Nothing in heaven and earth could take its place.

One night a month arrives the new moon,

Blended into the darkness and impossible to see.

Like being in remote recesses of a darkened room,

Waiting for the moon in such a dark ebony sea.

Waxing and waning on those lonely nights,

Our lonely moon fixed within our lonely sights.

On its journey through the night as a ghostly echo,

Singing melancholy songs of sadness and joy in solo.

- - - - -

Copyright © John Herlihy

Friday 3 October 2025