A Tribute to John Steinbeck’s The Moon is Down:
The moon is down
The darkness descends
Embracing in slow degrees
The earth and men.
The creeping blackness darkens
The chilling coldness, freezes
The mind, body, and soul
Confused first, then angered
Biding time,
till a speck of light flashes
Illuminating,
The path to walk.
The speck turns in degrees
Into a beam, bringing radiance
Swallowing with tentative bites
The enclosing darkness,
Until a fire is kindled
Fierce and burning
Ominous and menacing
Vowing to engulf,
The chilling coldness
The maddening darkness
Promised by the invading hand
Choking free life.
They rise,
worse than any earthly force
Burning everything
In its ferocious force
Even as one by one falls
To taste the sweetness
of freedom that will come
When the moon shines bright
once again, on the clear sky.
© Piyangie Jay Ediriwickrema
