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A few days ago, the poet glanced at the moon from a garden.
For a second, the moon looked close enough to grasp but – realising it’s receding from earth at the rate fingernails grow (one and a half inches a year) the poet dashed off this poem:
waxing gibbous moon
floats pale between the branches
ghostly slingshot stone
slowly spinning out into
deep space
around
the hungry
sun which will consume us all.
Like everyone, the poet feels days getting shorter as life lengthens – but has also heard that days, actually, are getting longer – over a dozen microseconds longer, every passing year.
And all this time, the sun’s expanding, slowly turning itself into a red giant star, growing more than a hundred times larger. It’s getting ready to devour and feed on the planets, with Mercury and Venus first in line to be consumed.
What unspeakable things Gaia has in store for us in 5 billion years’ time, the poet thinks.
They stop reflecting, dazzled enough by these facts to let stillness soothe their mood as the moon inches away.
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Ō
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Photos taken by Freddie Oomkens earlier this week