We are stardust, this week, under a Harvest Moon.
As I researched the dates of a long-ago year’s full moons, I learned that each month’s moon has a name.
This made immediate sense to me, a long-time admirer of Nashville’s Jason and The Scorchers and their song, “Under A Harvest Moon.”
Why September tomatoes and blackberries seem sweetest, why farmers markets in September seem most complete, why the Washington State Fair in Puyallup with its agricultural displays and baking contests are left to September: the Harvest Moon.
But each month has not one name, but many names, conferred by myriad, far-flung peoples.
The Inuit might not feel any resonance at all from the full moon of September.
An Irishman might call the March full moon Pat’s Moon, while readers of farmers almanacs call it the Worm Moon.
Once, I called the January moon the Clam Chowder Moon, probably because I needed to think of a name fast for an arts & crafts project so I went with that. Water Moon would be a better name. “God’s Spirit hovered over the waters,” says the beginning of Genesis. The almanacs list it as the Wolf Moon.
February is listed as the Snow Moon. I called it Potato Moon. Now, I call it Skunk Moon in honor of the florid and flamboyant skunk cabbages that pierce the muddy miasmas of wetlands toward the end of the middle of Winter.
March they call Worm Moon. I called it Pizza Moon. Why not Still Moon to honor the distilleries that brew the spirits we enjoy on festive occasions such as St. Patrick’s Day?
April: Hot Dog Moon? Any month could be Hot Dog Moon. Pink Moon is nice. The Chills did a song, “Rolling Moon,” on a CD that includes “Rolling Moon.” Okay? Rolling Moon it is!
To be a child served a dish with rice pilaf and shape that rice into a perfect moon shape is a sublime memory. In Sei Shonagon’s Pillow Book, she discourses frequently on the Moon’s power to waken memories of the pleasantest and melancholiest sort. May could be Rice Moon, or Flower Moon, if one feels pastoral in the bucolic English sense.
Only one month rhymes with Moon, so June Moon is worth considering. But a million big and tiny insects take that notion and amend it to Junebug Moon. Another type of bug is the jitterbug, a dance people do late at night during summertime parties that last all through the soft, fragrant summer nights. Jitterbug Moon then, although this might be one of the names with lesser staying power.
July has the Buck Moon. As in, 4th of July fireworks that give you more bang for the buck? No, deer. Maybe this one should be the Ice Cream Moon. Flag Moon? Trout Moon? August, in one telling, is the Sturgeon Moon, so, as if such a thing is even possible, I say, “Too many fish.” For years, some one I know has called it Grapefruit Moon. Who can improve on that? I don’t see any raised hands out there, at least none I care to call on.
Sometimes in August, the heat builds up so ridiculously in an upstairs, non air-conditioned apartment that one must flee to the shade of the tall trees of a nearby cemetery. While there, I’d have lunch, including a peanut butter and jelly sandwich. Peanut Butter And Jelly Moon will remind us of the crappy apartments of our youth, but there will be no such thing because the fish need a moon, and they have the Sturgeon Moon of August.
Give up on your gardens, everybody– it’s about to get cold and wet. Those green tomatoes aren’t turning red. Who knows what’s up with that tomatillo plant that sprouted dozens of blossoms months ago, but those haven’t gone anywhere. Remember those corn plants? The squash, the zucchini, the bok choy, the chard? Better luck next year, hapless, half-hearted gardeners. Maybe we should call it the Sushi Moon.
October has been listed as the Hunters Moon. In that vein, maybe Slayer (as in Buffy The Vampire Slayer) Moon.
Witch Moon is persuasive. Pumpkin Moon. Black Cat Moon. Black Moon…. That could be a keeper.
The books faithfully list November as the month of the Beaver Moon. So as long as we’re coming completely from way out in left field, why not Puppy Moon? We have the dog days of Summer. Astronaut Moon? Soul Moon? Bleak Moon? College Moon? Monsoon Moon? Mons Moon it is!
The Cold Moon is the final official moon. Captain Kirk met many characters in his travels, and of all the souls he met, Mr. Spock’s, he said, was the “most human.” If Jesus told Mr. Spock, “Fear not!” Mr. Spock would honestly say, “I do not.” In December, we sing “Auld Lang Syne,” and hope that all people will live long and prosper. December’s would make the best “Spock Moon.”
In the book, Owl At Home, Owl addresses the moon: “What a good, round friend you are!”
Indeed!