This Lunar Night

THIS LUNAR NIGHT

This lunar night
the houses of the street are quiet;
familiar shapes are cast in white.
Cats prowl their gardened territories,
the tawny frogmouth and the owl
keep watch on silence, possums climb
through silver clusters of thin leaves,
a flying fox flits over fields of stars,
a far dog barks, a bandicoot
scrabbles in the ghostly earth,
and pale moths mass on the window pane-

for half this world's inhabitants
awake to light
this lunar night.

(c) Mark Scrivener 2001