Artwork: Print by Kenny Random, *Stay Wild Moon Child*, 2025

On nights he couldn’t sleep
he’d run with wolves
in the forest
on the outskirts of town.

The mask of his everyday
self, would disappear
with the moon as his guide
his skin a pelt of fur.

And he’d howl in concert
with his friends, face
arced to the sky
sounds carried on the wind.

Too soon the moon
would fade with the
light of dawn and he’d
shed fur for civility.

A slow walk from the woods
along roads, and then
houses and shops and
home, his other family.

Yet on one night
becoming morning
as he walked
he saw a girl.

Silhouetted and perched
on the roof of a house
head tilted to the fading
light of the moon.

Face obscured, she wore
a mask, so strange the boy
stopped and wondered,
how could this be?

Who was she?

A girl with a mask
like a fox, staring
at the moon
still as a statue.

And he wished
for the first time
he could reveal
his wildness.

To share the moon
and the night
to howl with another
voice like his own.