The Night the Moon Sank

The moon tonight--I'm not making this up, Nicole saw it, too, and can vouch for me--was a deep yellow when we walked out her house, yellow like you think of the Harvest moon being (though it was at half and not full and it's the summer not fall). Shone clear enough though to make it seem close, like it lived here and not-out-there-in-space, like it meant to hang right across the lake, like across the land across the lake was, in fact, a whole different world, a queendom of the moon--and not just a convenient place for cancerous sub-suburban growth to pave over.

Maybe the moon saw, in her bright yellow glory, that people had taken over her land and that's why she gave up. See--as we stood across the lake from the moon-come-to-earth, Nicole in my arms our eyes on the sky--the moon seemed to start sinking into some clouds and I know, I know you're going to tell me the moon doesn't sink into clouds, winds blow clouds not quite four-hundred-thousand miles in front of the moon's face, so the moon doesn't even notice when she's hidden from our view but I'm telling you, tonight the moon sank.

I was holding Nicole and before our very eyes the moon let herself sink down into the clouds deeper and deeper until they covered her almost completely, until there was nothing to see of her strong yellow light than what looked like a crack in the sky. Yes, the moon let herself sink down and the sky let herself crack and then the crack blacked over and there was nothing left but the night and the stars and the scarred sky and me holding Nicole and wondering what did it mean that this just happened.

Wondering if any second one by one the stars will just start to put themselves out.