man in the moon

by Linda M. Crate

intangible as the concept of orange,
he slipped away into the wilderness —

he was not missed by humanity who
had always considered him ‘odd’; he

befriended the wolves, lived among
the mandrakes; he had the twenty first

century breathing down his neck, and
he hadn’t liked it’s icy fingers, colder

than winter’s breath; thus, he escaped
with his life before they cracked the

yellow bones in his chest and made
a feast of the corpse of his words, he

felt more fulfilled being in love with
the sea than he ever had his wife, felt

like more of a father to the mushrooms
to his own sons and daughters; he didn’t

mean to leave them, but he could not do
right by them by remaining, and thus he

rescinded from them becoming the man
in the moon with silver omniscient eyes.