The Third Full Moon in a Season of Four

The gathering storm eats

this true blue moon,


a dry wafer, soft hazy red


against the tin horizon.






It slips like a shining quarter


into a jukebox of cloud,


lingers gleaming in the dark coin slot


while the sad song plays.






We walk on bundled and


stiff like scarecrows into


the blustery November dusk.


We came to watch the full moon rise,






but what seems more pertinent now


is how this diaphanous disk


of sanguine floats pale


and quiet as milkweed seed






on the edge of the wind


and then is gone. There is


something rare yet relevant


in the way it disappears top first






into ambiguous lips of gray,


like the way you pull me


into your love from whatever


sorry spin my mind puts me in.

We tread our rambling path


calling owl and raven,


dizzy from the hordes


of squawking geese






hurtling above our heads.


The leaves crisp from their fall


crackle under our feet.


We have become deeply familiar






with how the rippled lake


smooths itself into evening,


how the shadowed land stretches and


yawns as the sleep of winter nears.






We wonder if the glowing gold eyes


of coyote will follow us into the dark.


There is something amazing,


something intimate and perhaps enduring






in how our footprints freeze in mud.


We have been this way a hundred times


through blistering summer heat and sudden


spring rains. Nothing ever remains,






yet this sunken moment


of our meandering, frosted in


the last blood of sunset,


glimmers as night closes in.

Copyright 2010 by M. D. Friedman.
Please visit www.mdfriedman.com to see more of M. D. Friedman’s work.