(the second full moon in a given month, occurring about every 2 1/2 years)   

isn’t blue, but pearly as an abalone disc
washed ashore above the roof tops. 
We shuffle out in our slippers and night clothes, 
in time to see it break free above the tree line/2
almost bouncing as the trees relinquish it.
I help you find it, that flood of light, 
with your broken eyes, and we stand
here swaying with the trees
marveling. 

At the last blue moon we must have been 
learning to stand to the newest loss, 
your cancer finally behind us, and the Parkinson’s, 
your dis-integrating vision waiting in the wings.
At the next one, for all we know we may be gone, 
and so I yip a tentative yip, and then you 
yip back in your crumbly voice 
that gives way a bit, falls back, and then 
my voice begins to fill out, lift into a howl
and then, neighbors be damned, 
another howl for both of us, 
round and full of all the lost and broken things, 
lifts up in my chest, pours out of my throat 
and the long high note spins 
all that loss into silver light.