Eight Phases: a lunar bibliography/road map/study guide
1. New moon
Since you can’t see it, listen.
Songs:
- Calling the Moon – Dar Williams
- Moondance – Van Morrison
Podcasts:
2. Waxing crescent
Hint of things to come, beginnings, longings.
- Moon River – Audrey Hepburn/Henry Mancini
- Just Like the Moon – Brett Dennen
- Pink Moon – Nick Drake
3 Pinterest search terms to pass the time:
Moon gate Lunar Symbols Mooning*
*You won’t be sorry. This is not a series of images of people’s backsides. Many pieces of moon art, moon factoids, moon photos. Tell the search bar you didn’t mean morning. Mooning. Mean it.
3. First Quarter
Moon of Caution
When the moon comes up, the bells are lost, and then appear impenetrable paths.
— Federico Garcia Lorca
According to many shamanic websites, during this time things could go either way. It’s a time to make choices/balance. Doors are cracked open.
Places not to go during the first quarter moon:
- Gateways to Hell
- Scary Roads
- Scarier Roads
- Krispy Kreme – Let caution be your byword. Make good choices.
- Back to Rockville – If REM is to be trusted.
4. Waxing Gibbous Moon
Moon of Endings
I see the moon and the moon sees me
The moon sees the somebody I’d like to see.
— Nursery rhyme
Gibbous songs:
- Halo – Depeche Mode
- Bad Moon on the Rise – Credence Clearwater Revival
- Destination Moon – They Might be Giants
Ends of the Earth: moon sounding places:*
- Moon Township, Pennsylvania
- Half Moon Bay, California
- Crater Lake, Oregon
*May not actually bear any real relation to the moon.
Bonus places: (actually on the moon)
5. Full moon
Since Lorca’s poem goes on to advise that no-one eats oranges under a full moon, here are some acceptable full moon foods for a midnight cookie feast:
- Moon pies
- Vanilla Almond Half-Moons (Vanillekipferl, Austrian Cookies)
- Cool green fruit (This is Lorca’s solution to what to eat, but I prefer the cookie idea, personally.)
Songs for a full moon:*
- The Whole of the Moon – The Waterboys
- Man on the Moon – REM
- Walking on the Moon – The Police
*Best hummed while looking through the telescope in Flagstaff, Arizona, where they say Buzz Aldrin first got a good gander at where he might later plant his foot print.
6. Waning gibbous
See also:
- Sailor Moon
- Moon Rabbit
- Minerva
7. Last (or Third) quarter
Try Googling:
- Lunar Baedeker
- Art Deco moons
- Ai Wei Wei
8. Waning crescent
On the way back to the darkness
Moon idioms and vocabulary associated with the moon:
- moon struck
- lunacy
- honeymoon
Three short poems about the moon:
- Moon by Kathleen Jamie
- The Moon Was But a Chin of Gold by Emily Dickinson*
- Sonoma Fire by Jane Hirschfield
*written in her own hand
Image Credit: “Private Moon in Romania,” Leonid Tishkov
Sarah Ann Winn‘s poems and hybrid pieces have appeared or will appear in Cider Press Review, Hobart (online), Massachusetts Review, Quarterly West, and RHINO, among others. Porkbelly will be releasing her micro chapbook, Haunting the Last House on Holland Island, in Summer of 2016. Her chapbook, Portage, is available as a free download from Sundress Publications. Visit her at http://bluebirdwords.com or follow her @blueaisling on Twitter.
