I capitalize the Moon. Proper noun, proper sphere; a sign of respect. I write about the Moon.

I write about what I know.

This Moon tonight is the only one I truly know. Yes, this magnificent universe, and possibly the one beyond, has many moons, but this Earth has only one. The others (181 and counting) appear to us only as stars, small planets, space junk, and such.

Our Moon, full right now, is the only one I care about. I do not have the need, or the bandwidth, to concern myself with any, or all, of the others. This Moon alone is above my reach, but never beyond my imagination.

Planetary science has nothing to do with my Moon, it is all about the dreams and the space allowed.

At the age when I viewed the first Moon landing only on television, and not outside with the naked eye, I realized the Moon was never as close as it appeared. From that time this orbital delight has become a fascination to me. As I grow older, with each orbit around the Sun, my allure (some may say obsession) with this Moon has only become heightened.

By high school, certainly by my time in the compulsory rocks & stars university course, I was pretty much done with a practical scientific view of the element. Even my view of the Moon through photography has been more of art than of science.

Should I choose to read of the Moon, my preference has been poetry, where the words have not only been more accurate, but deeply personal. The Moon is routinely a theme or topic of many favourite poems, as familiar as love and heartbreak, pain and persistence, and so often intertwined.

You learn about yourself, as you learn of the Moon. Life lessons are to be learned.

Of Shakespeare’s 160 sonnets, four, I feel, mark the passage of man, through life or the ages. These four sonnets, I believe, speak directly of, or to, the Moon.

Thus I pass by, at any age, in any phase, as does the moon; dependent upon the light of others, always a part of the landscape, noticeable more at night, and consistent if not dependable.

I respect the Moon as I respect myself, and, even then, not enough.

© 2018 j.g. lewis

Sonnet 35
William Shakespeare

No more be grieved at that which thou hast done:
Roses have thorns, and silver fountains mud,
Clouds and eclipses stain both moon and sun,
And loathsome canker lives in sweetest bud.
All men make faults, and even I in this,
Authórizing thy trespass with compare,
Myself corrupting salving thy amiss,
Excusing thy sins more than thy sins are:
For to thy sensual fault I bring in sense—
Thy adverse party is thy advocate—
And ‘gainst myself a lawful plea commence.
Such civil war is in my love and hate,
   That I an áccessory needs must be
   To that sweet thief which sourly robs from me.