Full moon in Northumberland
Moon of Northumberland. If more people could see what I see, there would be even less sanity in the world. It can turn the most reasonable person into a berserker.
It was a large, round moon hanging alone in the southwest quadrant of the sky’s vault at 1840. When a thin cloud slid across it, knifing it in two halves, the memory of Wozzek was unavoidable. The cloud gone, the moon shone in its primeval wholeness and it was again a casta diva, perfect circle, full of grace – the object of worship in Norma or Turandot. A virginal she – la luna – on the Mediterranean, a sinister he – der Mond – in Austro-Germany, the moon is a neutral, remorseless, glacial androgyne in these parts. A cold fire. A burning ice. Wholly genderless, but charged with sex, madness and unbounded strength. It is a fierce, wild force that’s flooding the field with silver flames out there.
Oh, and on this clear night I could see the tree the moon must have been hiding behind last night. A thick monster of a tree, getting too tall and too heavy for its own good – an unpoetic reminder of how much there is to do around here.