Supermoon - Aug 31 2023

 

Supermoon

Aug 31 2023

The moon

will never be closer to earth

than this.

And as it rises

just above the horizon

the disc looks impossibly big,

looming over me

and glowing moodily

with orange-yellow light.

And when I return to earth

and eye the ground ahead

I'm drawn inexorably back,

as if some new kind of gravity

that acts on human consciousness

had me in its thrall.

Its crated surface

is so sharply defined

it feels I could reach out and touch

its craggy ridges and blasted rock

and finely sifted dust.

That something so big

doesn't fall from the sky

seems to defy intuition

let alone the laws of physics.

But there it is, hovering airily;

and I’ve never felt more aware

of the vastness of the universe

than seeing this super-sized moon

wherever I turn.

Nor more aware

of my own insignificance,

scurrying about, ant-like

down here on earth.

Too small

to even cast a shadow

in its overpowering light.

A mercifully short one. I always end up liking those best.

Not sure “ant-like” is any good: hardly original! But somehow, it insisted on being put there.

A supermoon is when the moon is at its closest point of orbit to earth. This won't happen again until 2037. But this time, it is also a “blue” moon: when it's full twice in the same month.

For me, the poem came out of the blue as well. It's been overcast, and I haven't been following the lunar cycle. But suddenly there it was, rising through the trees: an orange-yellow orb that seemed impossibly large, every feature of its surface sharply honed.