This poem appears in the Fall 2011 issue of Modern Age. To subscribe now, go here.
The moon’s margin, like a mark in chalk,
incises the sky-scape— circumscribed silver.
Note carefully. Captive though it seems,
Moonlight’s mobile. The margin bleeds.
The sky’s piebald, peppered with powder
that’s bold and boundless. It bathes the trees.
A light dusting decorates the dew-drops.
The serpent stream with strident strains
sounds a concord— cold counterpoint—
with moon-flecks tinkling. Myriads of moonlets
bobbing on the lake form lively lines.
A line more lofty, lean and snow-capped,
finishes and fades in the fine silver.
The mountain fails in the moon’s midriff.
The Pale-bodied Mistress, like milk that’s spilled,
moistens each surface with her self solely—
her substance, light. Lady Luna,
do you diffuse, fecund in your fineness,
to find your likeness? The light’s alike,
along the lakes below the clouds
as on the moon. Mare Frigoris
dazzles with a brightness abrupt and brittle
but not of its own. Nor do the treetops
with spindly tangles speak a language
designed below. They lisp their lines
with a voice from elsewhere. Vain to deny it,
the serpent stream— startling beauty—
but sounds the lays his Lord writes him.
The white mountain, mickle and mud-bound,
father-like and firm, is a stone finger—
pale sign-posting. He points past you.
Yet, Moon, suffuse our night.
Press close against your kind:
prismatic rays of Light
shine brighter recombined.
Joshua F. Drake is associate professor of music and humanities at Grove City College, with research interests in late medieval music, art, and literature.
