Look up and smile

Smile at the moon

Is the moon lonely up there in the night?

All on its own – way out of sight

Behind the clouds and right up high

It looks quite clumsy in all that sky

And what does it do…why is it there?

A huge bright eye that likes to stare

Sometimes it’s there and sometimes it’s not

A mottled face or a cheesy dot

It can wax or wane – whatever that means

And is much much bigger than it actually seems

A quarter of a million miles away

It bears man’s prints from his short-lived stay

From Latin’s Luna we get our moon

And the poem of a dish and a spoon

The tides of our oceans obey its desires

It follows our planet but never tires

In music and words the moon appears

It makes us laugh and forces our tears

A moonlight sonata, a river, or face

Shakespearean play or prayer for grace

A sea of tranquillity looks down on us

On our deserts and lakes, our fields green and lush

A core of iron with a surface of rocks

It decides our dates, our moods and our clocks

They say it gives a vampire its might

And shines to guide us on pitch black nights

But perhaps we’ll never really know

What’s behind the creamy, patchwork glow

The earth’s protective satellite

Amazing, proud and always bright

Gaze up one night and stay a while

And give our moon a friendly smile

S.Y. Palmer