Moon-Viewing Around the World

tonight’s moon—

will there be anyone

not taking up a pen?

This famous haiku is by Onitsura, adapted from a translation by R. H. Blyth. It captures the spirit of being inspired by the moon, whether we seek it out when we know the moon is full, or happen to see it when we’re not expecting it. How easily the moon can move us to poetry.

         *      *      *

Albert Einstein once noted, “I like to think that the moon is there even if I am not looking at it.” At many moon-viewing celebrations I’ve attended at the Seattle Japanese Garden, the moon remained hidden behind clouds. We could not look at the moon, yet we could enjoy our longing for it. Some years, the weather was more promising, and later in those evenings we saw the moon quietly rise above the pine trees to the southeast, reflecting in the pond where we had just launched a hundred small candle-boats.

         *      *      *

The following are three haiku from Japan, these versions also adapted from translations by R. H. Blyth:

whatever we wear,

we look beautiful

when moon-viewing Chiyo-ni

the thief

left it behind—

the moon at the window Ryokan

brilliant moon,

is it true that you too

must pass in a hurry Issa

         *      *      *

In Japan, the moon is especially revered in autumn, and countless haiku and tanka poems have been written to sing its praises. But the moon, of course, is also revered in other cultures. If you might imagine yourself in a Japanese garden after dark, waiting for the full moon to rise over the pines, you can embrace the following celebrations of our earth’s celestial orb. Imagine not just a Japanese garden, but how the moon is appreciated around the world by young and old. So, tonight, we will hear from numerous writers—and a few philosophers—from various cultures, including Japan, all commenting on that mysterious chunk of green cheese that flies through our night sky.

         *      *      *

Let us begin with a myth from the Salish Indians of the Pacific Northwest:

A wolf once fell madly in love with a toad. One night he set out to catch her and woo her, and prayed to the moon for bright light. The moon obliged. The wolf chased the little toad, and just as he was about to catch her, she made one wild and desperate jump and landed on the moon, where she stayed.

         *      *      *

To a different kind of myth, here is a description by Mark Twain from Chapter 19 of The Adventures of Huckleberry Finn:

Sometimes we’d have that whole river all to ourselves for the longest time. Yonder was the banks and the islands, across the water; and maybe a spark—which was a candle in a cabin window; and sometimes on the water you could see a spark or two—on a raft or a scow, you know; and maybe you could hear a fiddle or a song coming over from one of them crafts. It’s lovely to live on a raft. We had the sky up there, all speckled with stars, and we used to lay on our backs and look up at them, and discuss about whether they was made or only just happened. Jim he allowed they was made, but I allowed they happened; I judged it would have took too long to make so many. Jim said the moon could a laid them; well, that looked kind of reasonable, so I didn’t say nothing against it, because I’ve seen a frog lay most as many, so of course it could be done. We used to watch the stars that fell, too, and see them streak down. Jim allowed they’d got spoiled and was hove out of the nest.

         *      *      *

Here, now, is a poem by Walter de la Mare, entitled “Silver”:

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;

One by one the casements catch

Her beams beneath the silvery thatch;

Couched in his kennel, like a log,

With paws of silver sleeps the dog;

From their shadowy cote the white breast peep

Of doves in silver-feathered sleep;

A harvest mouse goes scampering by,

With silver claws and a silver eye;

And moveless fish in the water gleam,

By silver reeds in a silver stream.

         *      *      *

Not everyone has love for the moon, or perhaps we can say that some people view the moon in ways that are not idealized. Here are some of the lyrics from “The Moon’s a Harsh Mistress,” a 1974 song by Jimmy Webb, perhaps best known in the recording by Glen Campbell:

See her how she flies

Golden sails across the sky

She’s close enough to touch

But careful if you try

Though she looks as warm as gold

The moon’s a harsh mistress

The moon can be so cold

         *      *      *

Choosing to consider the moon scientifically might render it “cold” to some viewers. Here are some “Facts About the Moon,” excerpted from a poem by Dorianne Laux:

The moon is backing away from us

an inch and a half each year. That means

if you’re like me and were born

around fifty years ago the moon

was a full six feet closer to the earth.

What’s a person supposed to do?

I feel the gray cloud of consternation

travel across my face. I begin thinking

about the moon-lit past, how if you go back

far enough you can imagine the breathtaking

hugeness of the moon, prehistoric

solar eclipses when the moon covered the sun

so completely there was no corona, only

a darkness we had no word for.

And future eclipses will look like this: the moon

a small black pupil in the eye of the sun.

But these are bald facts.

What bothers me most is that someday

the moon will spiral right out of orbit

and all land-based life will die.

The moon keeps the oceans from swallowing

the shores, keeps the electromagnetic fields

in check at the polar ends of the earth.

And please don’t tell me

what I already know, that it won’t happen

for a long time. I don’t care. I’m afraid

of what will happen to the moon.

Forget us. We don’t deserve the moon.

Maybe we once did but not now

after all we’ve done. These nights

I harbor a secret pity for the moon, rolling

around alone in space without

her milky planet, her only child

         *      *      *

Environmental writer Rachel Carson has written in a similarly factual way about the moon and the tides, in her 1950 book, The Sea Around Us:

The tides are a response to the mobile waters of the ocean to the pull of the moon and the more distant sun. In theory, there is a gravitational attraction between every drop of sea water and even the outermost star of the universe . . . Anyone who has lived near tidewater knows that the moon, far more than the sun, controls the tides. He has noticed that, just as the moon rises later each day by fifty minutes, on the average, than the day before, so, in most places, the time of high tide is correspondingly later each day. And as the moon waxes and wanes in its monthly cycle, so the height of the tide varies. Twice each month, when the moon is a mere thread of silver in the sky, and again when it is full, we have the strongest tidal movements—the highest flood tides and the lowest ebb tides of the lunar month. These are called the spring tides. At these times sun, moon, and earth are directly in line and the pull of the two heavenly bodies is added together to bring the water high on the beaches, and send its surf leaping upward against the sea cliffs, and draw a brimming tide into the harbors so that the boats flat high beside their wharfs. And twice each month, at the quarters of the moon, when sun, moon, and earth lie at the apexes of a triangle, and the pull of sun and moon are opposed, we have the moderate tidal movements called the neap tides. Then the difference between high and lower water is less than at any other time during the month.

         *      *      *

Continuing with a scientific or factual perspective, we know that the moon has five distinct phases—sometimes full or new, sometimes a crescent, sometimes half, and sometimes gibbous, or more than half. When it is waxing, its horns point towards the east, and when it is waning, its horns point towards the west. Christina Rosetti has a short poem about this observation, called “Lady Moon,” or “how to tell her age”:

O Lady Moon, your horns point towards the east—

             Shine, be increased;

O Lady Moon, your horns point towards the west—

             Wane, be at rest.

         *      *      *

We may love the moon best when it is full, but the moon can please us in any of its phases, and whatever its phase, the moon can help us appreciate what is around the moon, as demonstrated in this poem by the author of The Haiku Handbook, William J. Higginson:

crescent moon

would I look at the clouds

without it?

         *      *      *

Walt Whitman has offered this passing description in his poem “The Last Sunbeam”:

     Lo, the moon ascending,

Up from the east the silvery round moon,

Beautiful over the house-tops, ghastly, phantom moon,

     Immense and silent moon.

         *      *      *

Robert Service has written eloquently about that immense and silent moon. Here is “Moon-Lover,” sparkling with rhyming quatrains:

I.

The Moon is like a ping-pong ball;

I lean against the orchard wall,

And see it soar into the void,

A silky sphere of celluloid.

Then fairy fire enkindles it,

Like gossamer by taper lit,

Until it glows above the trees

As mellow as a Cheddar cheese.

And up and up I watch it press

Into appalling loneliness;

Like realms of ice without a stain,

A corpse Moon come to life again.

Ruthless it drowns a sturdy star

That seeks its regal way to bar;

Seeming with conscious power to grow,

And sweeter, purer, gladder glow.

Dreaming serenely up the sky

Until exultantly on high,

It shimmers with superb delight,

The silver navel of the night.

II.

I have a compact to commune

A monthly midnight with the Moon;

Into its face I stare and stare,

And find sweet understanding there.

As quiet as a toad I sit

And tell my tale of days to it;

The tessellated yarn I’ve spun

In thirty spells of star and sun.

And the Moon listens pensively,

As placid as a lamb to me;

Until I think there’s just us two

In silver world of mist and dew.

In all of spangled space, but I

To stare moon-struck into the sky;

Of billion beings I alone

To praise the Moon as still as stone.

And seal a bond between us two,

Closer than mortal ever knew;

For as mute masses I intone

The Moon is mine and mine alone.

III.

To know the Moon as few men may,

One must be just a little fey;

And for our friendship’s sake I’m glad

That I am just a trifle mad.

And one with all the wild, wise things,

The furtive folk of fur and wings,

That hold the Moon within their eyes,

And make it nightly sacrifice.

O I will watch the maiden Moon

Dance on the sea with silver shoon;

But with the Queen Moon I will keep

My tryst when all the world’s asleep.

As I have kept by land and sea

That tryst for half a century;

Entranced in sibylline suspense

Beyond a world of common-sense.

Until one night the Moon alone

Will look upon a graven stone . . .

I wonder will it miss me then,

Its lover more than other men?

Or will my wistful ghost be there,

Down ages dim to stare and stare,

On silver nights without a stir—

The Moon’s Eternal Worshipper?

         *      *      *

Let us go now from a long poem to a short one. Here is a tanka by the Japanese poet, Shikibu:

The way I must enter

leads through darkness to darkness—

O moon above the mountains’ rim,

please shine a little further

on my path.

         *      *      *

The following are some even shorter poems from Japan, half a dozen haiku by Bashō, Japan’s most admired master of the genre, here adapted from the translations of R. H. Blyth:

the moon swiftly fleeting,

branches still holding

the raindrops

now and then

the clouds give rest

to the moon viewers

autumn moon—

I wander around the pond

all night long

the poor boy

grinding up rice

gazes up at the moon

in the moon-viewing party

there is none

without a face of beauty

autumn’s full moon—

children sitting in a row

on the temple verandah

         *      *      *

Do we connect with the moon, or does the moon connect with us? Rolf Jacobsen, one of Norway’s greatest twentieth-century poets, has a poem about the moon titled “Look,” translated here by Robert Hedin:

The moon thumbs through the book of the night.

Finds a lake on which nothing’s printed.

Draws a straight line. That’s all

it can do.

That’s enough.

A thick line. Right to you.

—Look.

         *      *      *

This next poem also refers to the book of the night. It’s called just “Moon,” and it’s by Mark Strand:

Open the book of evening to the page

where the moon, always the moon appears

between two clouds, moving so slowly that hours

will seem to have passed before you reach the next page

where the moon, now brighter, lowers a path

to lead you away from what you have known

into those places where what you had wished for happens,

its lone syllable like a sentence poised

at the edge of sense, waiting for you to say its name

once more as you lift your eyes from the page

close the book, still feeling what it was like

to dwell in that light, that sudden paradise of sound.

         *      *      *

Syrian poet Lahab Assef Al-Jundi has a moving poem also simply titled “Moon,” his patient teacher:

Companion of lonesome hearts.

Dreamy shepherd of starry-eyed lovers.

Cratered dusty-faced rock.

This night you shine through

is just a shadow.

Our smallness makes us believe

the whole universe is immersed in darkness.

Midday sun burns on the other side.

Daylight everywhere!

Moon,

perhaps you are here to illuminate

our illusion?

If all suns are extinguished,

all moons and planets collapsed

into black holes,

what tint would space be?

What are colors without eyes?

How do we sense a vibrating universe?

Go ahead and laugh, hanging moon,

I raise my cup to you—

patient teacher.

         *      *      *

Here now is a poem by Australian poet Zora Cross, titled “The New Moon”:

What have you got in your knapsack fair,

White moon, bright moon, pearling the air,

Spinning your bobbins and fabrics free,

Fleet moon, sweet moon, in to the sea?

Turquoise and beryl and rings of gold,

Clear moon, dear moon, ne’er to be sold?

Roses and lilies, romance and love,

Still moon, chill moon, swinging above?

Slender your feet as a white birds throat,

High moon, shy moon, drifting your boat

Into the murk of the world awhile,

Slim moon, dim moon, adding a smile.

Tender your eyes as a maiden’s kiss,

Fine moon, wine moon, no one knows this,

Under the spell of your witchery,

Dream moon, cream moon, first he kissed me.

         *      *      *

From Australia let us now travel to many places in the world in a single poem, ending up in Malaysia. The following poem, “Speech Balloon,” is by British poet Imtiaz Dharker:

The Liverpool boss was pretty chuffed with himself,

said the news report, for being so tough

when he decided to snub the obvious choice

and go instead for the goal machine.

I’m over the moon, they said he said.

I’m over the moon, he said.

The Barnsley manager was lost for words

to describe his feelings when Chelsea fell

to the Tykes. We played fantastic.

I never thought we’d do it again

but we did, we did, and all I can say is

I’m over the moon, they said he said.

I’m over the moon, he said.

The Hollywood mum was way beyond thrilled

according to friends, when she delivered

into the world, not one bouncing baby

but twins instead to the astonished dad.

I’m over the moon, they said she said.

I’m over the moon, she said.

Bollywood’s hottest couple was proud to be blessed

by the jubilant father, the superstar.

It’s a match made in heaven, he said to the press,

Between two shooting stars with shining careers

and I’m over the moon, of course, he said.

I’m over the moon, he said.

The Malaysian nation went mad with joy

on independence day in its fiftieth year

when a doctor-cum-part-time-model,

a local boy, went up into space in a Russian Soyuz

and in zero gravity, performed his namāz.

All of Malaysia over the moon, they said on the news,

twenty-seven million people over the moon.

You must have noticed, it’s really quite clear,

this condition has spread, it’s happening there,

it’s happening here. It’s full-blown, grown

beyond every border, to the furthest corner

of every country where English is spoken

or English is known.

There’s no-one just satisfied or mildly pleased

or chipper or chirpy, contented or cheerful,

no one glad or gratified, delighted or jubilant,

elated, ecstatic, joyful or gleeful.

All the happy people have left this world.

You won’t come across them any time soon

and if it’s happy sound-bites you’re looking for

you need to look way over your head

for the words in balloons

to the place where the cow keeps jumping

over and over

with all the footballers, team managers

and lottery winners, world superstars,

heroes and champions and legends and lovers

and proud mums and dads

and the whole of Malaysia

over the moon

over the moon

over the

over the

over the moon.

         *      *      *

Let us now return to Japan for a brief myth story about the Lady in the Moon:

Once upon a time, a woodsman and his wife lived on the edge of a forest beneath Mount Fuji. They had a comfortable home and a beautiful garden, but no children. One moonlit night, the wife slipped out of the house and prostrated herself before the great mountain with its shining snowcap. She begged Fujiyama to send her a child.

     As she prayed, a tiny light appeared high up on the mountain and drifted downward, until it reached the branches of a bamboo. It was a moonchild, sent by the Lady in the Moon. The woodsman and his wife were overjoyed.

     The moonchild grew up into a beautiful girl, a moon princess, loved dearly by her mortal parents and by all who saw her. The son of the emperor begged for her hand, but the moonchild refused him, saying she was bidden by her true mother, the Lady in the Moon, to return home when she reached twenty years of age.

     When the night for her departure arrived, the woodsman, his wife, and the emperor’s son were consumed with grief. The Lady in the Moon sent down a silver beam, and the princess wafted up. All the way, she wept silver tears for those she left behind. As the tears fell, they took wing and floated away everywhere over the land.

     Her tears can still be seen on moonlit nights. Some call them fireflies, but those who know the tale know they are the tears of the princess as she searches for those who loved her on earth.

         *      *      *

In the century after Bashō, another great Japanese master of haiku was Buson, who was also a marvelous painter. The following five haiku have been adapted from the translations of R. H. Blyth, and each one expresses a gratitude for life.

the moon in highest heaven

I pass through

a poor quarter

drawing near the pear tree—

a lonesome

moon viewing

in pale moonlight

the wisteria’s scent

comes from far away

by moonlight

the blossoming plum

is a tree in winter

such a moon—

even the thief

pauses to sing

         *      *      *

The moon may sometimes feel wistful and lonely, but we may find hope despite that loneliness in this poem, “Morning Song,” by Sara Teasdale:

A diamond of a morning

     Waked me an hour too soon;

Dawn had taken in the stars

     And left the faint white moon.

O white moon, you are lonely,

     It is the same with me,

But we have the world to roam over,

     Only the lonely are free.

         *      *      *

Another remarkable Japanese master of haiku was Issa, who wrote these six moon poems, adapted again from R. H. Blyth’s translations:

after the cleaning,

Zenkōji Temple—

the bright autumn moon

autumn of my life—

the moon is flawless

and yet

the child sobs

“give it to me!”

the bright full moon

whose is it, then,

my children—

this red, red moon

bright autumn moon—

pond snails

crying in the saucepan

the full moon—

my ramshackle hut

is as you see it

         *      *      *

Let us migrate briefly from Japan to China. The following is “Moonlit Night,” a poem by the eighth-century Chinese poet, Tu Fu, translated by Vikram Seth:

In Fuzhou, far away, my wife is watching

The moon alone tonight, and my thoughts fill

With sadness for my children, who can’t think

Of me here in Changan; they’re too young still.

Her cloud-soft hair is moist with fragrant mist.

In the clear light her white arms sense the chill.

When will we feel the moonlight dry our tears,

Leaning together on our window-sill?

         *      *      *

Here’s another Chinese poem, “Night Thoughts,” by the twelfth-century poet Lu Yu, translated by Kenneth Rexroth:

I cannot sleep. The long, long

Night is full of bitterness.

I sit alone in my room,

Beside a smoky lamp.

I rub my heavy eyelids

And idly turn the pages

Of my book. Again and again

I trim my brush and stir the ink.

The hours go by. The moon comes

In the open window, pale

And bright like new money.

At last I fall asleep and

I dream of the days on the

River at Tsa-feng, and the

Friends of my youth in Yen Chao.

Young and happy we ran

Over the beautiful hills.

And now the years have gone by,

And I have never gone back.

         *      *      *

The Chinese also have moon stories, and the following is a Chinese Buddhist allegory:

A hare, a monkey, a coot, and a fox became hermits in the wilderness after swearing to kill no living things. The god Sakkia decided to try their faith, and appeared before them in the form of a Brahmin begging alms. First he approached the monkey, who gave him mangoes. Next he begged the coot, who gave him fish found on the banks of a river. The fox gave him a pot of milk and a dried liguan fruit.

     But when the Brahmin approached the hare, the hare said, “Friend, I eat nothing but grass, which I think is of no use to you.” The Brahmin replied that if the hare was a true hermit, he would offer himself as food. The hare immediately agreed to do so, and further agreed to the Brahmin’s request that he jump into a fire so that the Brahmin would not have to kill and dress the hare.

     The Brahmin lit a fire and the hare climbed on top of a rock and jumped. Just before he reached the flames, the Brahmin seized him and revealed himself as the god Sakkia. He placed the hare in the moon so that every living thing in the world could see it as the exemplar of self-sacrifice.

         *      *      *

Further east, from India, come these words from Siddhartha: “Three things cannot be long hidden: the sun, the moon, and the truth.” Also from India, Mother Teresa offered this: “See how nature—trees, flowers, grass—grows in silence. See the stars, the moon, and the sun, how they move in silence. We need silence to be able to touch souls.”

         *      *      *

The Koran, in Surah Al-Nahi, verse 12, tells us that “He hath constrained the night and the day and the sun and moon to be services unto you, and the stars are made subservient by His command.” And in the Bible, verses 3 and 4 of Psalm 8 declare, “When I consider your heavens, the work of your fingers, the moon and the stars which you have set in place, what is man that you are mindful of him, the son of man that you care for him?”

         *      *      *

To return again to the land of the rising sun, here’s a selection of fifteen haiku by various Japanese poets about the moon:

the moon in the water—

broken and broken again,

still it is there Chōshū

the moon in the water

turns a somersault

and floats away Ryōta

the bright moon:

on the tatami mat

the shadow of the pine tree Kikaku

even to the saucepan

where potatoes are boiling—

a moonlit night Kyoroku

bright moon—

smoke creeps over

the water’s surface Ransetsu

the waterfowl

pecks and shivers

the moon on the waves Zuiryu

bright autumn moon—

however far I walk, still far off

in an unknown sky Chiyo-ni

scooping up the moon

in the wash basin

and spilling it Ryuho

bright moon—

no dark place

to empty the ashtray Fugyoku

I keep hanging the moon

on the pine tree, and taking it off

gazing at it the while Hokushi

tonight’s moon!

unthinkable

that there is only one! Ryōta

the thief

left it behind—

the moon at the window Ryōkan

whatever we wear

we look beautiful

when moon-viewing Chiyo-ni

talking to the bridge guard

I gaze a goodbye

to the moon Taigi

after the moon viewing

my shadow walking home

along with me Sodō

         *      *      *

When are out at night, hoping to see the moon, perhaps in a Japanese garden, we sometimes do not succeed. Thwarted desires for the moon have happened for centuries, as recorded in this poem by eighteenth-century poet Miura Chora, translated by Geoffrey Bownas and Anthony Thwaite:

You watch—it’s clouded;

You don’t watch, and it’s clear

When you view the moon.

         *      *      *

Yet still we look, with longing, and whether we see the moon or not, we might be moved to write a poem. Here’s a pragmatic one by Stanford M. Forrester:

my haiku about the moon—

outdone

by the moon

         *      *      *

Archibald MacLeish has a verse about the moon in his longer poem, “Ars Poetica.” Here’s that verse:

A poem should be motionless in time

As the moon climbs,

Leaving, as the moon releases

Twig by twig the night-entangled trees,

Leaving, as the moon behind the winter leaves,

Memory by memory the mind—

A poem should be motionless in time

As the moon climbs.

         *      *      *

Contemplating the moon need not be all serious and philosophical. Children’s poetry also celebrates the moon, in a spirit of delight and exploration, with the buoyancy of having just landed on the moon. “Wynken, Blynken, and Nod,” by American poet Eugene Field, is one such celebration:

Wynken, Blynken, and Nod one night,

Sailed off in a wooden shoe.

Sailed on a river of crystal light,

Into a sea of dew.

“Where are you going, and what do you wish?”

The old moon asked the three.

“We have come to fish for the herring fish

That live in this beautiful sea.

Nets of silver and gold have we!”

Said Wynken, Blynken, and Nod.

The old moon laughed and sang a song,

As they rocked in the wooden shoe,

And the wind that sped them all night long

Ruffled the waves of dew.

The little stars were the herring fish

That lived in the beautiful sea.

“Now cast your nets wherever you wish

Never afeared are we”;

So cried the stars to the fishermen three:

Wynken, Blynken, and Nod.

All night long their nets they threw

To the stars in the twinkling foam

Then down from the skies came the wooden shoe,

Bringing the fishermen home;

’Twas all so pretty a sail it seemed

As if it could not be,

And some folks thought ’twas a dream they dreamed

Of sailing the beautiful sea

But I shall name you the fishermen three:

Wynken, Blynken, and Nod.

Wynken and Blynken are two little eyes,

And Nod is a little head,

And the wooden shoe that sailed the skies

Is a wee one’s trundle bed.

So shut your eyes while mother sings

Of wonderful sights that be,

And you shall see the beautiful things

As you rock in the misty sea,

Where the old shoe rocked the fishermen three:

Wynken, Blynken, and Nod.

         *      *      *

We all know the Mother Goose rhyme:

Hey diddle diddle, the cat and the fiddle,

The cow jumped over the moon,

The little dog laughed to see such sport,

And the dish ran away with the spoon.

         *      *      *

A famous poem by Edward Lear, “The Owl and the Pussy-Cat,” also celebrates the moon. This is the poem’s final stanza:

“Dear Pig, are you willing to sell for one shilling

     Your ring?” Said the Piggy, “I will.”

So they took it away, and were married next day

     By the Turkey who lives on the hill.

They dined on mince, and slices of quince,

     Which they ate with a runcible spoon;

And hand in hand, on the edge of the sand,

     They danced by the light of the moon,

          The moon,

          The moon,

They danced by the light of the moon.

         *      *      *

This next poem, by Ted Hughes, describes a young child excited by the moon. It’s called “Full Moon and Little Frieda”:

A cool small evening shrunk to a dog bark and the clank of a bucket—

And you listening.

A spider’s web, tense for the dew’s touch.

A pail lifted, still and brimming—mirror

To tempt a first star to a tremor.

Cows are going home in the lane there, looping the hedges

         with their warm wreaths of breath—

A dark river of blood, many boulders,

Balancing unspilled milk.

“Moon!” you cry suddenly, “Moon! Moon!”

The moon has stepped back like an artist gazing amazed at a work

That points at him amazed.

         *      *      *

One of the first words I remember my son saying as a toddler was in response to the moon. We were visiting Japan and the full moon had just risen while we were driving in a car. From his carseat, he pointed at the huge bright whiteness as the horizon and excitedly said “Ball!” I don’t think he knew the word “moon” yet. Here’s another children’s poem, “Half Moonshine,” by contemporary writer Judith Viorst:

The moon is the sun’s silver mirror.

The moon is a chunk of green cheese.

The moon is the home of the man in the moon.

The moon tugs the tides of the seas.

The moon is where astronauts moon-walked.

A cow once jumped over it too.

Half of these stories are moonshine.

Half of these stories are true.

The moon has astonishing mountains,

Piercing the lonely moon sky.

The moon has a goddess—Diana’s her name.

The moon is a million miles high.

The moon marks each month as it passes

And has since the world first was new.

Which of these stories are moonshine?

Which of these stories are true?

         *      *      *

You may wonder how the myth began that the moon is made of green cheese. In the year 1546, a writer named John Heywood made one of the earliest references, if not the first, to the moon this way, saying simply that “The moon is made of a greene cheese.” The word he used for “greene” had an “e” on the end, however, and it meant new or unaged. Francois Rabelais and Thomas More also wrote about the moon’s cheese being new and unaged. But did anyone ever really believe that? In 1638, British clergyman and philosopher John Wilkins wrote that “You may as soon persuade some country peasants that the moon is made of green cheese (as we say) as that ’tis bigger than his cart-wheel.” At the very least, as American writer and teacher Sheila Ballantyne once said, “The moon develops the imagination, as chemicals develop photographic images.” Or at least they used to. We can trust that the moon still does.

         *      *      *

And now an American folk rhyme:

I see the moon and the moon sees me

The moon sees the one I long to see.

God bless the moon and God bless me

And God bless the one I long to see.

         *      *      *

Here’s a childhood folklore story:

Fairy rings are circles of inedible mushrooms that grow naturally in grassy places in Europe, Britain, and North America. Folklore holds that if a person stands in a fairy ring under a full moon and makes a wish, the wish will come true. And to see the fairies who are usually invisible except to those with second sight, one must dance around a fairy ring nine times under a full moon. But don’t do it on May Eve and All Hallow’s Eve, the two major festivals, because the fairies will be offended and carry you off to Elfland.

         *      *      *

In his 1932 book The Dream Keeper, Langston Hughes offers a melancholy poem for fairies titled “After Many Springs”:

Now,

In June,

When the night is a vast softness

Filled with blue stars,

And broken shafts of moon-glimmer

Fall upon the earth,

Am I too old to see the fairies dance?

I cannot find them any more.

         *      *      *

Let us return to more poetry from Japan. Here are poems by three great masters of Japanese haiku:

The clouds come and go,

providing a rest for all

the moon viewers Bashō

In pale moonlight

the wisteria’s scent

comes from far away Buson

Brilliant moon,

is it true that you too

must pass in a hurry Issa

         *      *      *

Poets writing haiku in English have also appreciated the moon. The following six moon poems are by poets from the Pacific Northwest:

all our differences

forgotten—

full moon Tanya McDonald

full moon—

from the cloud bank

a circle of light Doris H. Thurston

winter fog

the full moon

out of focus Marilyn Sandall

head raised to howl

with the coyotes out there

but where is the moon Helen Russell

clearer, higher

he blows the horn

to the new moon Francine Porad

I step into old growth:

autumn moon deeper

into sky Ruth Yarrow

         *      *      *

Not to be outdone, here, too, are three of my own haiku about the moon:

summer moonlight

     the potter’s wheel

          slows

ringing church bell—

moonlight dimmed

by a gentle snowfall

beneath the moon

the heron’s slow step

towards frog sound

         *      *      *

Perhaps we do not always need to see the moon to appreciate its stark and transcendent beauty. In the fourteenth century, Japanese essayist Yoshida Kenko, in Essays in Idleness, waxed poetic about the moon—or its absence:

Are we only to look at flowers in full bloom, at the moon when it is clear?

     No, to look out on the rain and long for the moon, to draw the blinds and not to be aware of the passing of the spring—these arouse even deeper feelings. There is much to be seen in young boughs about to flower, in gardens strewn with withered blossom.

     Men are wont to regret that the moon has waned or that the blossoms have fallen, and this must be so; but they must be perverse indeed who will say, “This branch, that bough is withered, now there is nothing to see.” In all things it is the beginning and end that are interesting.

     Rather than to see the moon shining over thousands of miles, it sinks deeper into the heart to watch it when at last it appears toward the dawn. It never moves one so much as when seen in gaps between the trees, pale green over the tops of the cedars on distant hills, or behind the clustering clouds after showers of rain. When it shines bright on the leaves of oak and evergreen, and they look wet, the sight sinks deeply into one’s being, and one feels “Oh! for a friend with whom to share this!”

     And must we always look upon the moon and the blossoms with the eye alone? No, in the very thought of it, in the spring though we do not go abroad, on moonlit nights though we keep to our room, there is great comfort and delight.

         *      *      *

Indeed, the moon is ultimately transcendent in our minds, whether we can see it clearly or not, in any of its various phases. British writer Mary Stewart, in her 1962 book, The Moonspinners, describes the moon wistfully:

When you walk at dusk down country roads, you may see three maidens spinning. They are water nymphs. Each has a spindle and is quietly spinning wool that is milk-white, like moonlight. It is moonlight. In fact, it is the moon itself. Their task is to see that night comes and the world gets its hours of deep darkness to ensure safety for all hunted creatures. Night after night, the maidens spin the moon out of the sky. As you notice the moon getting smaller, the ball of moonlight on the spindles grows larger until finally the moon is gone. There is a blessed rest. Then on the darkest night, the maidens go down to the water to wash their wool. As it slips into the water, a strand ripples along the waves until it reaches the horizon and you may see a curved thread of the new moon. When all the wool is washed and wound up into the full white disk in the sky, the moon-spinners start their task again—spinning back the moonlight to give our world its beautiful darkness.

         *      *      *

Ralph Waldo Emerson once said that “The man who has seen the rising moon break out of the clouds at midnight, has been present like an archangel at the creation of light and of the world.” Oscar Wilde wrote that “Beauty is a form of genius—is higher, indeed, than genius, as it needs no explanation. [Beauty] is one of the great facts in the world like sunlight, or springtime, or the reflection in dark water of that silver shell we call the moon.”

         *      *      *

The moon is endlessly appealing, especially after a long wait when it rises at last over the dark pines. When that happens, it’s no wonder that none of us can resist writing poems, perhaps haiku, as Onitsura predicted:

tonight’s moon—

will there be anyone

not taking up a pen?

         *      *      *

Let us conclude now, with five more Japanese haiku, again adapted from R. H. Blyth:

a lunar halo—

is it not the scent of plum-blossoms

rising to heaven? Buson

the moon in the water . . .

broken and broken again,

still it is there Choshu

the dragonflies

cease their mad flight

as the crescent moon rises Kikaku

that there is only one

is unbelievable tonight—

this harvest moon Ryōta

after the moon-viewing

my shadow walking home

along with me Sodō

         *      *      *

Or perhaps we need not conclude just yet. Here’s one more Mother Goose rhyme, a reminder to return to the delight of childhood. After we’ve spent our evening together (did you imagine being in a Japanese garden?), the time has come to find our way home, and to let the moon shine on our hearts as we nod off to a dreamy sleep:

The Man in the Moon looked

        Out of the moon,

Looked out of the moon and said,

        “Tis time for all children on the earth

To think about getting to bed.”

         *      *      *

Postscript

The Lady in the Moon story from Japan, shared earlier, ended with the suggestion that the tears of the departed moongirl remained in this world as fireflies. If poetry results from the spontaneous overflow of powerful emotion, as Wordsworth said, the emotion we feel in response to the moon can extend to other experiences too, such as fireflies. And if our joyous self-expression doesn’t happen spontaneously, that’s something we can cultivate. In Japanese haiku, the word “firefly” is a kigo, or season word, that indicates summer, just as “moon” traditionally indicates autumn. An appreciation for fireflies is much like an appreciation of the moon. Haiku master Bashō once wrote this poem:

seen in plain daylight

the firefly’s nothing but

an insect

         *      *      *

Here is a firefly haiku by Buson:

at a roadside shrine,

before the stony Buddha

a firefly burns

         *      *      *

And a poem by Hokushi:

for that brief moment

when the firefly went out . . . O

the lonely darkness

         *      *      *

American haiku poet Jeanne Emrich offers this haiku:

star gazing . . .

a firefly joins

Cassiopeia

         *      *      *

The fireflies have attended us briefly, but now their lights are flickering out. But they will return each season, just as the moon e