Standing on the crowded shoulder
of a humid Florida highway
in July 1969, my mother
and her family stood as one,
as asphalt-covered ground shook
and the hot summer air rumbled.
Oh my God!
There it is!
A voice arose from
a hushed mass of humans.
Necks arched back,
eyes all aloft.
Hands cupped over brows.
Like so many hunters,
they tracked the arc
of NASA Apollo 11's
launch trajectory.
Her hand high,
my mother's index finger
traced the rocket's roaring,
glowing flames
and cottony contrail plumes
as it sped through open skies.
My ancestors, my mother,
were there, bearing witness
to USA's first manned mission
en route to our Moon.
= = = =
My mother has long held that
her life's most magical moment
was when she saw mankind
soar to the heavens —
more so than her wedding day,
or the birth of her children.
It is this core memory,
the one she captured
as a girl of not yet twelve
that laid the foundations for
my parents' future decisioning
in selecting my namesake.
Decades later, I was born
under a waxing crescent
in the first lunar cycle
to follow a late September
Harvest Moon.
I hail from Greek mythology,
where I am called Artemis.
Savvy hunter under dark-lit skies,
she is rare, one of twelve Olympians.
Artemis, the Archer.
Drawn to and of the wild.
Skilled with a bow,
unyielding and precise.
Yet, still tender
to those in need.
Protector of fertility,
overseer of childbirth.
The elder, wiser sister,
an all-knowing caretaker
to Apollo,
that younger, impish twin.
Over time, Artemis merged
in collective myth and memory
with the Ancient Roman divinity,
the Goddess of the Moon, who,
like my government name, is Diana.
"Dia-“ means divine, goddess,
of the Ancient Greek dios,
belonging to heaven.
Dium, the universe.
And the Sanskrit Divya,
meaning: celestial.
I am born of the chase, of the light.
Patroness of the crossroads,
I am a perfect match for
my ever-balancing Libra scales.
From my earliest moments
of self-awareness, I have
loved the ancient tales of,
and homage to, my origins.
I have felt kinship
to our lunar neighbor,
my sister in purpose
and in name.
= = = =
Last evening,
in the waning light
of an early April dusk
on the Florida coast,
Artemis II lifted off from
Kennedy Launch Complex 39B.
It would prove to be NASA’s
first human-helmed
mission to the moon
in nearly fifty years.
Half a century since
my mother, so long ago,
stood transfixed
on that hot tar road.
Last night, as the boom and smoke
filled the Atlantic-ringed horizon,
awed crowds exclaimed in unison:
“Oh my God!” “Oh my God!”
I know this, not only in spirit,
but because I have
friends and neighbors
who filmed the sacred minutes
just before and after the launch
on their iphones from the
Kennedy Space Center viewing stands
and had shared this joy with me.
= = = =
A moment for innovation:
Held in their hands, each of my
friends' wee devices contain
more computing power alone
than the sum of all the computers
that the 1969 Launch Control Center
had at their disposal.
More technology
— often found casually stuffed
into a hoodies' kangaroo pouch
when not filming or scrolling —
than it had taken last century
to get men from Earth
past our atmosphere
onto the lunar surface
and safely back home.
A pocket rocket, indeed.
Then and always,
scales at balance:
Hope tinged with Audacity;
Precision undergirded by equations.
= = = =
On the ground, and in the sky,
the divine and the magic,
the wonder and the wisdom,
meets at the crossroads with science.
We know from school teachers —
informed by Carl Sagan and Moby,
that: ‘we are all made of stars.’
(“Star-stuff,” to fully quote Carl.)
Throughout time, our pull
from the Moon in turn draws our tides,
which has fed our planet
and kept humanity humming.
For a divine instant last night,
those pressed together
on Cape Canaveral —
and those of us viewing remotely
from streamed live feeds
and TV screens and shared clips —
we all forgot, for a tick, about politics
and the toll of umbrage and war.
In that sacred space,
Humanity was as one.
In that planetary pause, we recalled:
we are bound to our ancestors
through the fabric of our skies,
and through the forces of light above.
This morning, in a new dawn,
can we maintain the magic
of shared moments?
Look up, and feel amazement.
After all, it’s our Origin Story.
