Golden Moonlight

I saw a harvest moon tonight. The great lunar body loomed in the sky, drifting slowly like the pendulum of a massive clock, wherein a second could last an entire night. Luminating faintly in the night. Its form, like topaz, polished and cut with an immaculate degree of precision and care, glowed faintly in the night, as if it desired to bathe all that could be seen in its incandescent amber light. I stood out in the field where the soldiers used to practice the art of combat and stared upwards towards the moon as I enjoyed the frigid air of the night. I continued to look up at the sky, surrounded by the Magnolia trees that bloomed just the same as they did years ago. The beautiful leaves that seemed to engulf the entire world left naught but a miniscule void in the sky, not unlike the aperture of a camera. Through this perforation in the sky, I watched, and entertained the sophisticated ruminations that entered my mind like endless trains transporting glimmering stars, all arriving at the same lofty station at the center of a constellation. 

I thought about many things. Why does the moon glow? The answer is obvious, isn't it? Its radiance comes from the sun. So why then, does the moon glow white when the sun glows yellow? Another pointless question, isn't it? The light reflecting off the moon is weaker than the light originated from the sun, so its color is affected differently as it enters the Earth's atmosphere. So why is the moon orange tonight? The sun hasn't changed its color, has it? 

Of course not. The moon doesn't change its color on a whim. Any change in the colors of the sky can be explained scientifically, and therefore, predicted. This is the basis of meteorology. 

That is what we're taught, but... What if the moon stayed orange? What if that golden scintillation never changed? Would meteorologists find an explanation? What would the general populous think? Would it be described as an incongruous anomaly? A paradox? Or would it simply be an unexpected exception to the established prediction? 

The presence of something that exists in a time where it shouldn't. A harvest moon is equal parts exciting and fascinating due to the fact that it is rare, but it is still a naturally occurring phenomenon. Even if that moon were to be involved in an unexpected event, if its something that can be understood by scientists, by the human mind, then it can be explained. If something can be explained, it can be predicted. If something can be predicted, it has been observed by one of our senses. Information from the external world has been retrieved by your body via touch, taste, sight, sound, or smell, and transformed into sensory information to be processed by your brain, becoming part of your internal world. Humans are egotistical creatures. They appreciate that which can be understood, and despise that which cannot be. In this sense, humanity possesses an inherent abhorrence towards the external world, and find salvation through the internal world. 

What then, occurs when the moon turns an unprecedented shade? What would you do if you were to gaze up, just the same as I am now, and find yourself greeted by a purple moon? A green moon? Perhaps it is a moon that radiates every color that exists, perceptible and imperceptible all the same. A moon of many different shapes in many different places with many different names. An unexplainable moon. A moon that cannot be processed internally. An external moon. As humans loathe the incomprehensible, would this external moon become an enemy to mankind? 

As I gaze upwards towards the moon, I begin wonder, why has it retained its saffron hue all this time? I have grown to miss the aberration that is inherent to a harvest moon. I yearn for the ordinary, unremarkable white light of the moon. In this state of mind, I would find comfort even in an incomprehensible, external moon. 

A moon that exists in contrast to all known laws of the universe. A moon that defies our understanding of the external world. A moon that can be neither explained nor named. A moon that hovers vaguely outside of the glass shell of our world. A moon that can never be perceived because it exists outside of our own perception. 

I wonder, then... If I were to escape the glass barrier that confines and contains this world, might I be able to gaze upon that moon, if only a scarce fragment of time, so short that it cannot even be measured? If that moon truly cannot be understood, then a fleeting moment would suffice all the same to me as eternity. 

As I pondered endlessly, a single petal from the magnificent Magnolia trees drifted lightly through the sky, and landed on my nose, interrupting my inexhaustible stream of dialetics. Taking caution for its fragility, I carefully placed it into the pocket of my ornately decorated regal overcoat that sits perched atop my shoulders, in stubborn defiance to the expected laws of physics, before returning to my solitary chamber in the moribund castle. As I walked under the faint luminescence of the moon, I looked upwards repeatedly with an unrighteous adamance, as as if eager to catch the moon in its act, to bear witness to the exact moment wherein the mask is dropped, and the true form is revealed. Alas, this was naught but another haughty delusion of mine, and I continued to tread onwards under the endless golden moonlight.