As I walked my rounds on duty tonight, I couldn’t help being enthralled by the magnificent moon, “Luna,” as she rose up through the trees in the east. Most of the poetry we’ve been putting up here on the poetry page is stuff I wrote years ago. This is the first one that is fresh and new. I hope you enjoy . . .

      LUNA RISING

A purple glow lights the sky below,
Making the starlight flee.
Luna is rising to start her show,
And she’ll light this whole prairie.

The jagged line of the forest of pine
Saws into that growing light;
That moon will paint this world of mine,
My world, this world of night.

A coyote cry shrill from a far-off hill
Calls one he misses so;
While my grazing horse and a nearby rill
Are the only friends I know.

A golden brim cuts the sky so dim—
Luna is finding her way
Over the dark and depthless rim
As the owls come out to play.

It’s going to be a dream for me,
This mountain night so clear;
I’m on the edge of eternity,
And the angels have gathered here.

To make a trade for this forest glade
I’d never be able to do;
God’s hands are in this gift he made,
And I feel him with me too.

Luna is bold, and her sphere of gold
Guards over this heaven I found
And wandering spirits, ages old
Live here in this hallowed ground.

—Kirby Jonas
September 27, 2018

The moon tonight, and working on this poem, have put me strongly in mind of the second book I wrote with actor Clint Walker, titled CANYON OF THE HAUNTED SHADOWS, which is available only in electronic format at the moment but within a few months should be out in paperback as well. If you haven’t read the first book in what has become the BADLANDS series, YAQUI GOLD, you will also enjoy that one.