O'Hara's Moon

The Moon is not as gentle as the Sun,
sometimes it is too demanding, too bold
it rapped on my window with its
big blue hand telling me it was time
to go to sleep. “Your friend the Sun
told me about you. You like to work
when the Sun goes down. You don’t sleep enough.

Why do you scribble at that desk
with such a thin pencil
into the long hours of night? Don’t you know
that I come for you?
For all of you?"

I did not hear the Moon’s last words,
my eyes were not accustomed to
such a brilliant diamond shine.
It affected me,

“I am sorry,” I said, “but I am a poet
and I work at night. I mean not to
interfere with your duties.”

I noticed the Moon’s pocked silver face
was more smooth on the right side
as it tilted its round head downward.
The Moon’s lips were but streaks,
golden ethereal dust marks

on an old highway of a face.
I wanted them to blow away as it spoke,

“Most people wait for my arrival. Most people
sit on the edge of their small beds and
tap their small feet together and
count the minutes before
I come” he said.

“You should hang up the clothes of day,
wash off the face you wear to work,
clean the hands that catch the Sun,
and open the closet for your night”.

“Yes?” I asked. My eyes has adjusted
to the Moon’s reticent glare.

“Your closet will be filled with
the things of dreams...
tangerines and paintings,
and the music of Ella Fitzgerald.”

“Then I will come to keep the night
just lucid enough for you to feel
the thoughts float to the tips of your fingers
and slide into that thin pencil of yours.”

I watched as the Moon turned its back
and noticed how round and hunched its shoulders
were. As it slunk down the path to the next house
I began to get very tired. Pretty soon I was asleep.