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The Man in the Moon<\/strong><\/p>\n <\/p>\n I am watching the moon<\/p>\n when I bump into a man with just a mouth<\/p>\n in the middle of his face.<\/p>\n <\/p>\n This mouth—grins—and asks for a light.<\/p>\n Is this some kind of a joke?\u00a0 I ask.<\/p>\n <\/p>\n He twists and opens his ancient mouth<\/p>\n into the shape of a waiting grave.<\/p>\n <\/p>\n I stand looking into nothing.<\/p>\n <\/p>\n I don\u2019t know why or for what reason<\/p>\n but I suddenly recall a childhood<\/p>\n memory—a dream, or perhaps both.<\/p>\n <\/p>\n I can\u2019t be sure—maybe it is now I dream.<\/p>\n <\/p>\n A dream of such pure white snow<\/p>\n it clings like a freezing shroud<\/p>\n to the windward side of a young girl\u2019s face.<\/p>\n <\/p>\n Passing me on the street she smiles<\/p>\n so sweet a smile—its memory & sweetness<\/p>\n has lasted all of my days.<\/p>\n <\/p>\n \u201cHave you a light?\u201d the mouth demands.<\/p>\n <\/p>\n My hand, under a broken street lamp,<\/p>\n trembles & the flame\u2014ethereal—surges.<\/p>\n <\/p>\n Just before everything goes dark<\/p>\n something funny happens to the moon.<\/p>\n It tilts at a crazy angle as the universe<\/p>\n pours through a rip in the sky.<\/p>\n <\/p>\n <\/p>\n <\/p>\n Steve De France<\/strong> is a widely published poet, playwright and essayist both in America and in Great Britain. He has been nominated for a Pushcart Prize in Poetry in 2002, 2003 & 2006.<\/p>\n <\/p>\n <\/p>\n <\/p>\n <\/p>\n <\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":" The Man in the Moon I am watching the moon when I bump into a man with just a mouth in the middle of his face. This mouth—grins—and asks for a light. Is this some kind of a joke?\u00a0 I ask. He twists and opens his ancient mouth […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":4,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_et_pb_use_builder":"","_et_pb_old_content":"","_et_gb_content_width":"","footnotes":""},"categories":[7],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-6944","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-prose-poetry"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/inksweatandtears.co.uk\/archive\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/6944","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/inksweatandtears.co.uk\/archive\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/inksweatandtears.co.uk\/archive\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/inksweatandtears.co.uk\/archive\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/4"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/inksweatandtears.co.uk\/archive\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=6944"}],"version-history":[{"count":3,"href":"https:\/\/inksweatandtears.co.uk\/archive\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/6944\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":6946,"href":"https:\/\/inksweatandtears.co.uk\/archive\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/6944\/revisions\/6946"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/inksweatandtears.co.uk\/archive\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=6944"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/inksweatandtears.co.uk\/archive\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=6944"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/inksweatandtears.co.uk\/archive\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=6944"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}