Moon, I’ve been watching you, and I’ve seen how you lie lazily in the daytime sky, till it’s evening. When the night draws its invincible curtain upon the Earth, there you are, you light up.
While other humans may admire your ‘moonlight’, I know at the heart of it, you’re a copycat; the lesser light.
You shine what does not belong to you, yet you have the guts to claim a name for yourself in the cosmos. Shame!
Not your show
It’s no wonder we never sang about you back in the day.
“Twinkle twinkle little stars, how I wonder what you are…”
“Who made the shining stars, the shining stars…”
We loved the carols and sang them like it was all our voices were meant for. But to our minds, the words only meant as much as a tiny pebble at the foot of Everest.
Well moon, I’ll tell you why you never got a mention in our songs. You stole and still steal the show from our little stars!
They are tiny, shining dimly but with elegance, yet you delight in out-shining them. You take our eyes away from the beautiful twinklers and it’s time someone told you this: It’s not your show, moon!
But I understand that there is no honor among thieves. That is why you sunk that low, moon, competing with little stars.
Duel with the sun
In those days again, my curious mind would wonder, “Why can’t you shine as bright as the sun, yet you appear to be bigger?”
Staring at the sun with squinted eyes, all I could see was a little blue ball shining so immensely. Without a clue of its size and far reaching distance, I judged it smaller than you, moon. I couldn’t figure how the sun was so bright yet so small to my eye.
Well, you moon are quite the showman. But I’m wiser than that now, and I know it would take 64.3 million moons to fill the sun. Not so big of you, is it?
If you’re so intent on copying from the sun, at least take this useful cue: the sun burns its own fuel. Try that! You have your rocks, why don’t you try nuclear fusion on them?
Or if that doesn’t work, cos I doubt it ever would; burn them up with the sun’s heat? What a sight would it be to see you flare up!
I guess I should ask you, “Where were you, when the sun heaped up its humongous supply of hydrogen?” Let me guess, you were sitting still, hanging around the Earth, waiting to reap from the sun’s work.
Have you heard of the cuckoo bird? Its tactic is pretty much similar.
It fends on the effort of other parents to raise its young. It never broods its eggs nor does it ever feed its chicks. Such savagery instinct. I suspect the cuckoo learned this from you, moon.
Multi-shaped
It also bugs me why you keep moulting and changing shapes. I guess I could call you a shapeshifter. Quite the resume you have.
A few days ago, you were a little crescent moon. Now you’re grown into half. I see you’ve been enjoying the spoils of your plunder.
But you know crime bites back dearly. Soon enough, you’ll disappear; pay for your sins. Till then, I’ll keep count. Your 40 days end soon.
Enough said. I could go on but to spite you won’t do any good. After all, you were meant to rule the night.
Is there anything for which I could speak well of you?
For one, you were made exactly as you are. Whichever way you choose to shine, the Creator beheld and saw you good, so I’ll accept and behold your methods with awe.
And for the love of space exploration, it calms me down, to know that despite your actions, you might help steer us to the next big thing on space.
Cover image credits: macrovector/Freepik