Life on the Moon

The Fire Queen concluded her daily journey across the heavens’ blanketing dome. In her enchanting splendor, she set lower and lower behind the mountains, which rose higher by the moment like gigantic figures from the ground, with their violet shadows touching the sky’s scarlet blush. The emerald green of trees, underbrush, and grass transformed into dark hues as long shadows spread across the whole landscape where the sun’s pink rays still frolicked in an evening carnival just a few moments before. A lovely evening descended on mysterious wings across the land. The blushing west paled, the spheres’ magical music resounded in lovely harmony throughout the universe, and a sweet ache trembled in nature’s halcyon spirit. The silver Luna, along with countless stars that glittered with phosphorescent shine appeared upon the dark blue sky and its rays poured in every direction with a light misty veil that floated above the ground. A magnificent summer night began!

Sitting alone upon a not overly tall outcropping, near a sprawling city, I fell to observing these beauteous phenomenon. My soul worked stridently to free itself from a narrow physical shell that bound its shining wings upon which it often liked to fly to new, unknown realms and it longed and searched for mysterious things that were but a flash of precognition to human thought.

Moon rays fell in thick streams upon my forehead and merged with the depths of my dreaming eyes. I also began to experience their magical light and, unwittingly, those mysterious, unfathomable effects it elicits in many a person. I was disposed of strength by an irresistible force and nailed to a cold mountain outcropping like a second Prometheus. Hungry bands of eagles, vultures, or ravens did not circle above me, wanting to rip the innards from my body.

A portion of those silver bright rays suddenly seemed to thicken and converge to form a body whose outlines were reminiscent of a lovely female figure from one of the excellent paintings by master Bordone or the delightful statue of Venus by Byström. I wondered whether the appearance might not have been only an illusion.

Once the figure gained the form of a real human body, however, and I could easily recognize its heavenly face, exquisite hair, swan-like neck, alabaster hands, an ample, mother-of-pearl bosom obscured by a veil of fog, and aside the whole body being an unfathomable ideal of beauty, I could doubt no longer. An apparition reminiscent of a person came into being from my excited, concentrated delirium.

The magical apparition hovered within the moon’s rays as a heavenly phantom, looking at me with eyes that burned with tenderness. I felt sweetness and rejoiced in the dreamy intoxication, though my lips could not issue the slightest sound from my disordered interior.

Following a moment of heavenly delight that had been granted by the sight of this heavenly being, the beauteous shape descended next to me. I sensed her amber breath and an insatiable desire drove my arm to reach out toward her and never allow her to return to the ethereal realm from which she had descended upon a moon beam to the earth. My efforts were all in vain – my hands lay on the rocky outcropping as immovably as if they had supported the columns upon which the world rested.

“I know what you are thinking,” said this snow white being finally in a delightful voice.

My lips became capable of speech as if having been touched with a magic wand.

“Oh, my dear lady,” sang my lips in a tone full of passionate love and excitement, “oh, queen of my soul, may it be blessed! I am in your power and will gladly sacrifice my life for a single gratifying smile given to me, your undeserving admirer.”

The lovely smile that spread across the beautiful being’s features was my answer.

“So, I lay my life at your feet, my brilliant lady,” I called in a lovelorn voice, having become a sacrifice by virtue of my promise to her. “Yet, before you destroy my heart, tell me who you are?”

“Do not seek to know my origin for now,” answered the beauty seriously, “for every one of your attempts in this quest would be for nought. Nor should you give into your frivolous thought that I might return your quick and therefore shallow emotions. You’re the son of Mother Earth, while I am not of this world. Let’s not talk of this subject, this whim of fiery youth, any longer. Let’s engage ourselves in a conversation regarding more serious matters that are more dignified and suited to us. Simply know that I am the daughter of reason and the flower of a fertile imagination and because of where these develop the most, I also thrive there the most. Whatever lofty and admirable accomplishments humankind achieved in the arts and sciences has been thanks to me. The artist in a state of excitement embodies his ideal and transforms this ideal into a coherent representation of that ideal. I enhance human life pleasantly from the cradle to the grave, dressing it in grace and intentionally obscure human suffering; I elevate the human spirit from an empty, useless clod of earth toward starlit heights; I accompany them through the grand timeless labyrinth and reveal to them the unknown secret forces in nature’s workshop. Without me, humankind today would find itself at the same level as do the other creatures whose desires only lead to the fulfillment of their animal instincts.

Well, you now know the vast sphere of my influence. If you want to be added to the ranks of my admirers, of which this earth carries thousands of thousands upon its shoulders, I will admit you to my regiments. Firstly, you must pledge at the altar of the human spirit!”

“I am blessed, my lady, that you deem me worthy to join the ranks of those who pride themselves to wear that medal of the spirit.”

Soon as these words were said, my sight became obscured by a thick, impenetrable fog. In its midst multicolored circles began to form and rotate with an amazing, ever-increasing speed just a few steps away. The mysterious hum that had arisen in the meantime now slowly transformed into melodic and bizarre music, penetratingly yet pleasantly and soothingly influencing my senses. From beneath the ground on both sides of the colorful circles now shot giant tongues of flame from which gushed billions of sparks to heights that were incredible, connecting these two earthly columns with the star-filled skies. These colorful circles eventually changed to a pink hue which then thickened, filled with purple fog, and assumed the shape of a colossal altar. The purple fog eventually paled, and the altar’s outlines stood out even more sharply until an exquisite altar that nearly reached the heavens stood before my amazed eyes. An unusually bright star shone at its very top, its center being adorned with a laurel wreath. On the one side it was pierced by a silvery golden sword, while from the other by a blazing torch. Flowers of strange shapes and uncommon beauty wound around the gigantic colonnade where they dispersed their amber scents. In the middle of the altar blazed a golden fire and amidst its flames sat the priestess upon a throne that was richly adorned with pearls, rubies, emeralds, and diamonds. This was the same being that had swung upon the moon’s ray at first.

A handsome lad stood to her right, a type of belvederian Apollo brought to life as the representation of the arts, while on the left stood a slender lass of heavenly beauty whose allure was enhanced by her dreamy eyes that reflected her great and contemplative spirit. This goddess represented science.

As once upon a time during the age of heroism, the Israelite Joshua commanded the sun to stay its run across the heavenly sky for a short while, so did the priestess command the earth in a powerful voice to pause for a few moments.

The heavenly body immediately stopped the giant wheels upon which it rolled through its worldly space.

And lo! a sound as if from Eden? What a lovely and, to the human ear, unfamiliar harmony of notes resounded throughout the cosmos! That is the music of bewitching beauty, the music of cherubs who elicit sweet tones from the realms of sound with the greatest degree of enthusiasm.

Accompanied by this heavenly music, the priestess thus spoke:

“Come closer, son of man!”

Enraptured by these apparitions, I approached the altar, free of physical inhibitions.

“Swear that from this moment onward, you will pledge your life to the deeds of the spirit!” the priestess preached in a reverend tone. “Swear that you will lay enmity between yourself and those who pull back the bowstring, whether it be with the arrow of mediaeval relics, rotten principles and senseless notions with which they have shot the peaceful sun of enlightenment from the horizon of consciously aware nations, and who pointlessly clutch daggers in their hands so that they may damn the barely risen glimpses of freedom!”

“I swear!” I answered in a steady voice, lifting two fingers toward the blazing fire.

Soon as I pronounced these decisive words, the priestess stood from the beautiful throne and proceeded to step down from the altar toward me, then touched her alabaster hand to my forehead, stating in a serious tone:

“I unite with you, son of the earth, adorning you with the medal of the spirit, truth, and immortality!”

Sensing the light touch of her hand against my blazing forehead, I dropped to my knees before the godly being, grasping hold of her pure white robe’s hem, I kissed it with a thousand fiery kisses.

“Tell me who you are, dearest saint?” whispered my lips from within my dreamy intoxication, while my shining eyes delved into the depths of her enchanting sight. “Look, I humble myself to your largesse in the dust and in this holy rapture I kiss your feet. You have enlightened me with your charm, beauty, and reverence toward the gates of Eden, I have drunk to the bottom the enchanting drink from the golden chalice, with which you have watered my soul, though it had flown an eagle’s flight across ethereal realms in a starry blanket. Do not defer any longer, oh queen of my soul, to speak your noble name which makes you the equal of Gods!”

“Well, I am your own thought!” answered the mysterious being in a silvery voice and a hundredfold echo reverberated through the exquisite night, reflecting off the magnificent heavenly dome.

“Your thought – your thought …”

The heavenly spheres went silent all at once and only a faint echo of the beauteous chords resounded in the enchanted night, disappearing and ceasing ever more in the night air. The earth began again to roll onward upon its massive wheels. The altar of the human spirit dissipated like fog pierced by the sun’s rays. The glistening gold fire was extinguished from the altar and the royal throne vanished with it. The flames that had gushed streams of sparks along the altar’s sides began to vanish into the ground. Nothing was left of the human spirit’s prize, but for a stream of moonlight that merged with thousands of silver threads. In one of those rays floated the mysterious apparition again like a heavenly phantom that looked at me with her blissfully shining eyes. With a longing heart, I extended my arms toward her, but she escaped my fiery embrace. As if armed with daring wings, I suddenly flew after her. When I nearly, nearly felt her heartbeats upon my chest, just as steam would, so did the apparition always escape my embrace and beckoned me to follow from higher up on the moon beam. I no longer felt any air; only thin ether flowed through my chest. Yet higher and higher did my insatiable desire spurn me to follow my own thought. Before me glistened an enormous, round plain that shone with a sliver brightness. I was already distant a few thousand myriameters from the earth’s globe and the lovely being beckoned me to follow ever higher.

I finally reached the line at which the earth’s gravity ceases and the lunar force of attraction begins. Following the exhausting chase after my vision, I found a moment of respite at this boundary and stood there as if upon solid ground, having been freed of planetary gravitational forces. I looked from this astral world down into a vast abyss that stared at me with its bottomless crater. I saw a large, rounded object deep below, fifty times the size of the moon, from which I was no longer very far. This body was illuminated by phosphorescent light and floated calmly in the boundless, endless cosmos. It was the Earth, humanity’s cradle and its coffin! To which of those beings that live on other celestial bodies could it occur that upon this negligible speck of world, whose proportions would not appear larger to them if they were to have used binoculars similar to Herschel’s telescopes or Lord Ross’s gigantic reflectors, other beings might also live and that their lives might be interspersed with times of delights and sorrows, hopes and despair?

I was interrupted from these plaintive deliberations by an excellent aerolite, which approached me at a tremendous velocity. It was a meteor that had disturbed me from serious thoughts with its rare presence and reminded me of the snow-white apparition still aloft in the moon’s ray above me.

I had to follow her again. At that moment, I also recalled our younger generation of poets, who constantly drown above the heights of stars in their emotional creations. I truly wish that for just a few seconds these poets could find themselves at the dangerous station I had just left and then they would surely tire of outings to ethereal places and swear off the use of eagles’ wings for ever.

The shining silver plain before me gained ever more defined outlines and some of its places blazed with even more excellent light. I suddenly came to recognize highlands, valleys, as well as wide flatlands upon it. My lovely goddess intended to lure me all the way to the moon so I might become company for troubadour David, who elicited Strauss’s waltzes instead of psalmic melodies from his gold-stringed harp.