September Moon

(8 quatrains)

1. new moon

the clothesline shadow sharpens on white clapboards:

the wooden pins & dish towels float static

between lilac’s silhouette & the window:

sun crescent at the moon’s invisible edge

2. waxing crescent

crickets babble like invisible water

from all directions at once; white headlights flow

east-west, almost steady; afloat in heaven’s

black river: the crescent moon, luminous leaf

3. half moon

the smears where plums dropped to the concrete grow darker

where black plum leaves screen the streetlights; white roses

flank the dim sidewalk, but it’s clear they’ve gone past—

half moon in nameless purple sky: gaze elsewhere

4. waxing gibbous

kitchen light walks through the backdoor screen, stretches

out on the swing chair a low ginkgo bough holds

up—nothing else is stirring, not even that

moon half hidden in the ginkgo’s higher limbs

 

5. full moon

that sconce light on the sky blue wall shines inside

the picture window along with the porch light

across the avenue; in the backyard the

moon burns incandescent yellow by itself

 

6. waning gibbous

electric crimson roses climb the stop sign,

but the blooms don’t seem to listen; sunflowers

bask in light off clapboards: beside a building

made of windows, the waning moon hangs heavy

7. last quarter

clouds at the horizon are such as they are,

far west of the red-lettered gas station sign—

doubtful we’ll comprehend them in this lifetime—

the half moon’s vanishing in more than one sense

8. waning crescent

that flash of a small white plane overhead; I

mistook it for the moon, but it turns north—two

cabbage whites thread through a garden that’s gone past—

this crescent’s a paler cloud, off by itself

Jack Hayes

© 2017