Hello everyone –
This
weekend, skywatchers around the world will be able to see a celestial rarity –
a full Blue Moon – which will be close to Jupiter and Saturn in the
constellation Capricornus! You can read all about this weekend’s lunar events
at Earth & Sky, with a special feature article available from https://earthsky.org/astronomy-essentials/when-is-the-next-blue-moon/?utm_source=EarthSky+News&utm_campaign=3f8661e5f5-EMAIL_CAMPAIGN_2018_02_02_COPY_01&utm_medium=email&utm_term=0_c643945d79-3f8661e5f5-393539193.
So
just what is a Blue Moon? In this instance,
it’s the third Full Moon in a season of the
year that contains four (not the usual three) Full Moons. This is a truly rare
phenomenon that happens only once every 2.7 years or so (hence the expression,
“Once in a Blue Moon”). The Moon won’t actually appear blue in the sky this
weekend – but that’s OK – it will still be bright and beautiful, like every
other Full Moon that I’ve ever seen.
To
celebrate this auspicious occasion, here are some of my favorite poems about
the Moon, which has been my favorite
celestial object for as long as I can remember! J
Introduction
to Our First Poem:
The annual cycle of the seasons and its effects on our natural surroundings are
recurring themes throughout world literature. The Orphic poets – a guild of
ancient Greek philosopher-bards named after their legendary founder, Orpheus –
celebrated the changing of the seasons, the wonders of the natural world, and
their lofty ideals in poetic chants, several dozen of which were preserved in
written form after centuries of oral transmission. In the poetic forms of their
protoscientific age (ca. 1000-500 BCE), the Orphic poets chose to personify the
forces of Nature, the celestial orbs, and abstract ideals in order to explain
how and why the natural world and the human social order function in the ways
that they do. In the following poem, we can learn how the ancient Greeks
perceived the Moon, not as a dead rock in space, but as a living entity (or as
a celestial orb ruled by a divine guardian – in this case, Artemis [in Greek]
or Diana [in Latin]).
Orphic
Hymn #8: TO THE MOON
(The
FUMIGATION from AROMATICS)
Hear,
divine queen, diffusing silver light,
Bull-horned
and wandering through the gloom of Night.
With
stars surrounded, and with circuit wide
Night’s
torch extending, through the heavens you ride:
Female
and Male with borrowed rays you shine,
And
now full-orbed, now tending to decline.
Mother
of ages, fruit-producing Moon,
Whose
amber orb makes Night’s reflected noon:
Lover
of horses, splendid, queen of Night,
All-seeing
power bedecked with starry light.
Lover
of vigilance, the foe of strife,
In
peace rejoicing, and a prudent life:
Fair
lamp of Night, its ornament and friend,
Who
gives to Nature’s works their destined end.
Queen
of the stars, all-wife Diana hail!
Decked
with a graceful robe and shining veil;
Come,
blessed, divine, prudent, starry, bright,
Come
lunar-lamp with chaste and splendid light,
Shine
on these sacred rites with prosperous rays,
And
pleased accept your suppliant’s mystic praise.
“Faeries”
By Evaleen
Stein (1863-1923)
Grandfather
says that sometimes,
When stars are twinkling and
A New Moon shines, there come times
When folks see faery-land!
So when there’s next a New Moon,
I mean to watch all night!
Grandfather says a Blue Moon
Is best for faery light,
And in a peach-bloom, maybe,
If I look I shall see
A little faery baby
No bigger than a bee!
“Eldorado”
By Edgar
Allan Poe (1809-1849)
Gaily
bedight,
A gallant
knight,
In sunshine
and in shadow,
Had journeyed
long,
Singing a
song,
In search of
Eldorado.
But he grew
old—
This knight
so bold—
And o’er his
heart a shadow—
Fell as he
found
No spot of
ground
That looked
like Eldorado.
And, as his
strength
Failed him at
length,
He met a
pilgrim shadow—
‘Shadow,’
said he,
‘Where
can it be—
This land of
Eldorado?’
‘Over the
Mountains
Of the Moon,
Down the
Valley of the Shadow,
Ride, boldly
ride,’
The shade
replied,—
‘If you seek
for Eldorado!’
“The
Moon” (From A Child’s Garden of Verses,
1885)
By
Robert Louis Stevenson (1850-1894)
The
Moon has a face like the clock in the hall;
She
shines on thieves on the garden wall,
On
streets and fields and harbor quays,
And
birdies asleep in the forks of the trees.
The
squalling cat and the squeaking mouse,
The
howling dog by the door of the house,
The
bat that lies in bed at noon,
All
love to be out by the light of the Moon.
But
all of the things that belong to the day
Cuddle
to sleep to be out of her way;
And
flowers and children close their eyes
Till
up in the morning the Sun shall arise.
Until
next time – keep looking up! J
Rob
