By: M. Ocampo McIvor
Under fading stars,
the dark of night receding,
I drink in the setting strawberry moon
and toast the newborn day.
A glint of sunlight skims my eye
and I am struck by a drumming desire
to suck the juice of life,
urgent
raw
sap dribbling down my chin.
Now I lick the delicate dew of dawn
under magenta skies
while the tangy mist of morning
awakens drowsy petals.
Soon they will stretch toward
the noonday sun,
bright and crisp
as childhood memories.
From moment to moment
there is no guarantee,
so I feast upon the banquet of eternity
and have my fill of sweet, exquisite
mortality.
M. Ocampo McIvor was born in the Philippines, raised in Toronto, Canada, and currently lives in Seattle. Her work has been featured in The Bangalore Review, Conclave Journal, and Storgy Magazine. She is the author of Ugly Things We Hide (uglythingswehide.com).
"It was June, and I just learned that the full moon of the month is called the *strawberry moon*. It was so-named by Native American tribes because it coincided with their June strawberry harvest. I thought, how luscious! My mind conjured a vision of life as an exquisite banquet, made sweeter by its impermanence. I thought about my own mortality, about how much I want to do justice to my existence, how much I want to partake in everything life has to offer, to be completely full and completely spent at the end, grateful for the experience. And when my time has come to leave the banquet, how I hope the same for all the guests at the table.
This year's strawberry moon (2021) also happened to be a supermoon, the second and last one of the year. Bright afternoon at our kitchen table... I rinsed a bowl of strawberries to snack on, and wrote.
I hope you enjoyed the poem. Perhaps you'll remember it now and then, not just in June."