Reluctant Moon

In the dim-lit murk of memory

where thoughts stick

like boots in the marsh mud,

I sink into an image of you,

under a full moon,

our first.

***

Seated cross-legged on the almost floor of the night temple,

almost because weeds pushing through the cracked soapstone

offered more flora than floor.

Two ruined walls remained standing, crumbling

No ceiling left for them to hold

Only the starless templed sky

***

You sang

off-key and with much enthusiasm

the melody long-since forgotten

but your feral face turned moon ward

remains in my brain, unwrinkled

***

While others chanted, you

and I, blasphemous, laughing, sneaked off into the dream green wood,

padded barefoot down the pulpous moss bank

knelt before a sacred tributary,

and pressing unholy lips to water,

drank.

***

I tried to leave you first in Kipling’s India,

in Matthiesen’s Nepal, Ishiguro’s England,

in my many disordered states.

Throwing I Ching coins for guidance

I sought answers in the book you gifted

and inscribed, “For all the changes.”

What chance did I have?

***

Time rolled on and over my jagged ambivalence

leaving scree in its crevices

like oyster sands turned to pearls

some days moon-lustrous,

others wound rope-tight around my neck.

And still we loved.

***

Where we went, we were

When we paused, we were

Why we were was an unanswerable question

but one we asked of each other lying beneath

five-hundred and eighty-six cycles.

Not countless,

but never counted upon.

As familiar and mysterious as the tug of those moons

not yet waxed in our waning years

Note: I met the man who would become my husband during a full moon in a ruined temple a few hours hike from Rishikesh, India. I was eighteen. I had zero interest in finding a life partner. But we are here still. We've gone though so many changes from global nomads, to successful professionals, parents to two amazing daughters, and now, creeping into what must be our final phase. When I feel unsure of where I am in life, the changing constance of the moon is a comfort.