Grosvenor In View Magazine 2025

46 DEPARTMENTAL HIGHLIGHTS

The Absent Moon

holograms of tall hills separating us from the light of the night. I still remember the moon. Not in full, but in flickers. I scavenge light for a living. I search for batteries, lamps, and matches. Even though fire was banned after many disasters, many accidents caused by yearning for light. The only thing I carry is a mirror. Round silver and useless to most, but not me. I know mirrors were once used for more than just looking at yourself. They could reflect not just images, but longing. Every night I climb to the highest point in our small village - the forgotten greenhouse. There, I adjust my mirror towards the blank sky and whisper my plea to whoever may be listening. ‘Come back. We still remember.’ The wind never answered, but somehow the silence spoke one thousand words. One dark evening, as I climb to the greenhouse and adjust my mirror, I notice something strange out of the corner of my eye. A pale glow. I blink. Just above the horizon lies a sliver of light. A sliver of hope. Something familiar. The moon. Not rising but returning. As it spills its silver beams over the bruised earth, the city stirs. Doors open. Children point. Faces turn upwards in awe. The world, long blind, blinks. And remembers. The moon was not lost. Just waiting. Summer Bell 9E

The moon had paused ascending for a long while now. Long enough for people to have forgotten. At first, they said it was a glitch- a small malfunction in space. The tall men in dark suits with expressionless faces, trembling hands and trembling words

explained this to us easily, like it had been rehearsed. But after a while had passed without shimmering moonlight bathing the rooftops of our homes, we all knew something was wrong. Eventually we stopped asking ‘Why?’ and started whispering ‘When?’ Now, the nights are pitch black and permanent. Unnatural. As if someone had blinked and never reopened their eyes. In this city, everything now operated off borrowed light. Artificial light that grazes the now very empty stone footpath. It runs through the many cracks in our broken world. It will not last for much longer though. The amount of false light that has been used has damaged our planet. And we all know it. The stars are still there though. Still in the sky. Scattered like glitter on a page. Their bright glow now dimmed with no moon to accompany them. The once wonderful stories they would tell are now no longer. They now only stare down on us blankly. No purpose without the moon to guide them. Lonely without the moon beside them. Humans have adapted, as humans usually do. They now wear manufactured goggles to activate ‘day mode’ for the people who cannot manage in pure darkness for any longer. We now get vitamin D pumped into our veins and must pay for a glimpse of moonlight. The poor must live in raw darkness, only getting to dream of the shadows leaving and the moon returning. The rich buy designer sunrises and sunsets to ease their wanting. Projections of gold tinted clouds, beautiful pink and orange skies and

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