Poem Explaining the Purpose of the Moon
I have a theory born in grief
though tempered by hope:
When night shrouds this Earth
after someone we love dies
the moon becomes a hole in the sky
is no longer the moon shining
the sun’s reflection down on us
but a portal, a window, letting in
a glimpse of limitless light
from a place we can’t usually see
It’s that portal each loved one
we lose steps through as they leave
us behind, only to emerge blinking
I imagine, smiling, a hand shielding
their eyes, in a place beyond
our lives. A place somehow
familiar
yet new. A place they’ve felt
before
but never known until now
And in that place they wait for us
though our seeing into where they are
through this moon, this hole in the sky
can only last so long, perhaps only as
long as our grief is fresh or as long
as our minds are capable of pulling
us back and forth between life and
death
until this death becomes something
we can, we must, live with, because
somehow, the moon always seems
to become simply the moon again.
Except for those of us who know
otherwise.
