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To the Full Moon
Heavenly voyager, you course
Across the skies’ infinity—
The calm, serene celestial sea,
Which yields before your silent force—
Traversing the shoreless expanse
Of unplumbed ultramarine heights—
Or depths?—as countless, sparkling lights
Like myriad sea ripples glance.
Floating by lazily, you plow
The wispy silver waves aglow,
Bathed in the gentle light you throw,
Breaking white fast before your prow;
From Orient to Occident,
Coursing like a proud caravel
Majestically spread at full sail
Across the star-strewn firmament.
Voyager! From what distant port
In what far country have you flown?
What haven in what lands unknown
Do you now seek in your transport?
How often high above this earth
Have you crossed this unbounded sea?
This voyage is your destiny:
No port awaits to give you berth;
Forever you must cross the sky,
Ever onward, through star-tinged gloom,
Your only port your final doom,
Just as this world must—just as I.
.
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Adam Sedia (b. 1984) lives in his native Northwest Indiana and practices law as a civil and appellate litigator. In addition to the Society’s publications, his poems and prose works have appeared in The Chained Muse Review, Indiana Voice Journal, and other literary journals. He is also a composer, and his musical works may be heard on his YouTube channel.
Critics, editors, and many poets believe that poetry about the moon is passe–“everything that can be said has been said,” they contend. BS!–as this poem amply demonstrates. From our earliest childhood to our dying days, all of us are struck by the sight of the full moon, whether rising large and colored by the earth’s atmosphere, standing in full glory amid the stars on a clear midnight, or veiled and then unveiled by passing clouds. “Coursing like a proud caravel / Majestically spread at full sail” salutes the moon wonderfully. The anticipated, though still sudden turn at the end also evokes a common experience in lines that no prospective publisher should pooh-pooh.
Thanks for an elegant, elevated, and ultimately sorrowful song.
Thank you for the comment! This is one of about five or six moon poems I’ve written over the years. I don’t believe it’s possible to exhaust any subject matter. As Rimsky-Korsakov said, “The only thing new in art is talent.” There are as many new perspectives on each potential subject – even the moon- as there are minds to contemplate it.
I always look forward to your poems, Adam, and this one is surely no exception. It is so dense with imagery and metaphor, that it isn’t possible to take it all in in one reading (or several readings). I agree with Julian that a caravel (which I had to look up) is a wonderful image, held together by your extended metaphor describing the skies as a sea, with words and phrases like “shoreless”; “sea ripples”; “silver waves”; and “port”. And the final line is extremely poignant.
Thank you! Although I generally don’t like to have a wasted syllable in a poem, the lushness of the full moon on the night I saw it I thought demanded an exceptionally dense poem.
Ah, the moon – full of mystery. Thanks for addressing it with respect.
A thought-provoking piece, especially with the increased interest recently in the Moon which is making Earth’s sister less mystical.
Thanks for the read, Adam.
The central metaphor here is the moon as a ship, sailing across the endless sea of the sky, but Sedia links it to the uncertainty of where the “ship” comes from, and whither is it going. The moon is addressed as “you,” and direct questions are asked of it. This personifies it to some degree, especially in the last quatrain where the moon’s doom is mentioned — along with that of the entire world, and the poem’s speaker.
In Western culture, the moon is often imagined as feminine (luna) while the sun is thought of as masculine (sol). Sedia avoids any sexual identification here, so that we as readers can perceive the moon as only a vessel making an endless voyage with no observable purpose. The poem has a distinctly Romantic tone, such as one might hear in Shelley.
When I saw the full moon low in the sky, casting its light on wavelike clouds, its resemblance to an old sailing ship struck me immediately. I felt no need to personify it because of that. But the female aspect of the moon makes eminent sense, with its monthly phases and its softness compared to the masculine sun.
As for aesthetics, I fully confess to my love for romanticism and its style. But I did not consciously imitate Shelley. Actually, Shelley never ranked high among my favorite poets until I read “Mont Blanc,” which exposed me to another side of him that was not taught to me before.
Adam, you spend words and thought on creating a sense of infinity. Not “sky’s” but “skies,'” and the question of perception as to whether the sea should be described as having heights or depths. The combination adjective “unplumbed ultramarine” makes an expansive contribution. This poem addressed to the full moon leaves aside considerations of its other phases and of lunar periodicity. It’s more of a space poem than a time poem, ultimately focusing on the homelessness, or undetermined port, of this voyager in full sail. While this looks like gloom and doom for the moon, it elevates the observer whose voice comes in at the end. Because the speaker finds himself comparable to the moon in lack of ability to answer large questions of where and when, he takes on the seeming infinity the moon represents. Whether “doom” means “fate” or “judgment,” he like the moon enjoys the privilege of heavenly travel toward the unknown.
Wow! This is a wonderful deep dive into my poem and I must confess I am not a little flattered to see such thought directed at my creation. Thank you for the brilliant insight.
Ave Luna!
I love this poem Adam. It’s so well-crafted and the nautical imagery ties everything together into something so beautiful that it makes one sigh with pleasure. This is a Romantic-inspired charmer even with that ultimate acknowledgment of its transience — and ours.
Thank you for the kind words! I remember wanting to capture the lushness of that warm night with its full moon, and your comment satisfies me that I have conveyed something of that impression. “Makes one sigh with pleasure” is a high compliment indeed.
This poem contains an irresistible classical essence that makes the reader read it time and again. As is common to most ode poems, the first few stanzas are used for describing the subject, followed by the poet’s personal queries, and then the wrap-up that somehow relates things back to man and humanity. The moon coursing the endless black sea like a proud caravel is a beautiful description. For countless centuries (and even today), the moon has been a figure of beauty, but in your poem, Adam, apart from linking her life to that of a voyager, you’ve linked it to man’s too, who must keep himself afloat on this worldly sea, finding no permanent relief other than death. Also, I think the phrase “star-tinged gloom” signifies “hope-specked life,” i.e., a man’s life, which is mostly uncertain, has little orbs of hope in it that guide him.
I truly admire your poetic skill, Adam. Thank you so much for your gift!
Thank you for your kind words and for sharing what you have taken away from the poem. It’s always fascinating to see how different readers experience the poem differently. Not only are there as many perspective on a subject like the moon as there are poets, there are as many readings of each poem as there are readers.
Adam, this is great! The last stanza is my favorite; so much to think about there. I normally don’t even like nature poems, so you’ve done this really well. People seem to think there are only so many moon poems that can be written, but this poem proves them wrong.
You may be interested in this French moon poem: “Ballade à la Lune” by Alfred Musset: https://lyricstranslate.com/en/ballade-%C3%A0-la-lune-ballad-moon.html-0 (both French and English shown here). You can also find the French version on YouTube, sung by (who else?) Georges Brassens.
Thank you! I’ve written about four or five moon poems on my own. It’s a favorite subject of mine and one I think is impossible to exhaust.
Thank you also for introducing me to the Musset poem. I knew him through his fiction, but now I’ll have to check out his poetry. It’s a very comprehensive take on the moon, in a clipped verse reminiscent of some of Victor Hugo’s poetry.
Goethe’s “An den Mond” was my introduction to moon poetry, so I’m glad to find a French counterpart.
an all nighter for other reasons, my mind drifted to safe harbor for the ship, hovered for a moment on Charon’s boat, then back to safe harbor or safe home settled somehow on Milton’s “interlunar cave” I enjoyed the dreaminess, but really ought to get some sleep
I hope to circle back (sorry for the pun on the moon’s circling).