The half smiling moon

The moon smiled at me tonight. I don’t mean that as a figure of speech, it really and truly smiled at me tonight. It softened slightly the lump in my throat I was battling all night and just about becoming friends with. Not unlike how you get used to an unwanted guest who just won’t leave, who really gets under your skin, but then after a while you just learn to accept that they are not going anywhere. And you don’t have energy to keep asking them to leave.

But when the moon smiled it’s quirky little half smile, and sent its moonlight flitting over, and when the moonlight spread it’s mischievous twinkling silver glitter over the porch where I was sitting, the constriction in my throats eventually disappeared and in its place was peace. New, and fresh and tentative, but peace nonetheless and all the more precious for its tenuousness.

The feeling lingered through the night and was just about beginning to fade, when the kids, all six of them, dragged my friends and I out for a walk. The city girl in me is not much of a nature walker, but my girlfriends are and I went along for the company. But as the monsoon mist curled its way around the meandering path we were walking down, and as shade after shade of green in the valleys around assaulted my eyes and made me blink and stop and breathe, really breathe, it was impossible not to pause and listen.

They all speak, you see. The wild lily that’s blooming on the high rock that gently mocks you for ignoring her the first time you walked by. The shy and retiring yellow bloom that hides behind green leaves but gives you a glorious smile when you part the leaves to say hello. The tree that just lost all its leaves and makes a stark and lonely and stunning picture against the cloudy sky, narrating stories of loves gone by. The many wildflowers that vie with each other to grab your attention – the violets, the purples, the yellows, the golden and the reds, and many more – at times strutting their lovely heads and giggling when you spot them and bend for a better look and at times just taking your breath away when you turn a corner and suddenly come upon a sea of colour. And who can say the greens don’t speak – from the far away valley to the bushes by your hand – olive, bottle green, forest, lime, pine and so many more. They shout out loud and clear that old William Wordsworth knew what he was talking about when he wrote about the splendour in the grass in the Intimations of Immortality

“…….Though nothing can bring back the hour
Of splendour in the grass,
of glory in the flower…”

I remember coming across this poem as a tenth grader, and while I now realise I didn’t quite appreciate the haunting opening lines, they certainly made an impression even in my brash youth –

” There was a time when meadow, grove, and stream,
The earth, and every common sight,
To me did seem Apparelled in celestial light,
The glory and the freshness of a dream.”

But I do not agree with the revered poet on one key point here though. As the poem moves on, he talks about no longer being able to feel the freshness and beauty of nature as keenly as one grows older. I would argue with him quite animatedly if I came across him some day. For even my few hours spent listening to the valleys and the moonlight and the flowers and even the grass last night and this morning lightened my heart and quietened my racing mind and I can’t seem to get rid of the stupid grin on my face. I certainly can still feel the glory and freshness of a dream, in his own words. And I know deep in my soul that I always will.