Earth turns and the crown of the moon clears the clouds. As it does, the fainter stars begin to fade. No longer a full orb, the rising moon emerges, orange at first, then yellow, and the clouds lose its light and blend into the dark edge of night. By midnight the moon will be white, and high enough that the trees will cast lacy shadows across the land.
The wind will continue for hours, the river of its sound flowing away as the pale light flows here and there, pushing the darkness from one corner to another. Shadows of change creep relentlessly, marking this thin surface as the great bulk of Earth turns beneath it. Hello to each moment arriving, goodbye to each moment joining all those of the past, which never ceases gathering.
Sunday Verse
The Muse
by Anna Akhmatova
All that I am hangs by a thread tonight
as I wait for her whom no one can command.
Whatever I cherish most—youth, freedom, glory—
fades before her who bears the flute in her hand.
And, look! She comes . . . she tosses back her veil,
staring me down, serene and pitiless.
"Are you the one," I ask, "whom Dante heard dictate
the lines of his Inferno?" She answers: "Yes."