Remembering / Believing Moon

Jim LaVilla-Havelin

January 22, 2023

Oh, what we wouldn’t

give

for a good story

right about

now…

when she told us how she had misremembered

her journey west

the fabrication 

that is memory

we want

so much

to believe

I could tell you

about a full moon

above the Window,

Chisos Basin, Big Bend

and how that moon 

almost filled the rock-walled

vista as it rose

or over Casa Grande

if you faced the other 

way

or remember

top of the hill, Staten Island

the view across the harbor 

shining city and the big moon

balanced atop the twin towers

I could tell you

full moon, almost every month

makes an appearance over our meadow

spills milky light across the floor 

of my study and down the hall

silvers everything

would you believe me

would you need to see it

would you need to remember it

yourself

could you make it up?

Jim LaVilla-Havelin is the author of six books of poetry. His most recent, Tales from the Breakaway Republic, a chapbook, was published by Moonstone Press, Philadelphia, in May 2022. LaVilla-Havelin is the Coordinator for National Poetry Month in San Antonio.