It started shortly after I went to bed. A single voice, deep in timbre but androgynous of gender, that spoke with gentle intensity. I brought myself to full wakefulness and checked the usual sources of external voices, but all media devices were truly off, and no one else in the house was up.
As soon as hypnagogia seized me again, the voice resumed. The voice wasn’t angry, wasn’t pontificating, wasn’t pleading, wasn’t cajoling. It was like eavesdropping on a supernatural lecture, hearing a professor drone on to the class through a crack in the door. Except the class had a population of one, me. And the voice was certainly targeting my ear.
“The moon… is gilt… with silver.”
Gilt? Surely the voice means ‘gilded’, right? That’s an old spelling.
“The moon… is gilt… with silver.”
Oh. Well. That shift in emphasis was well noted. The ending ‘t’ was spoken sharp enough to shatter glass and deaden eardrums. Okay, ‘gilt’ it is, then.
“The moon… is gilt… with silver.”
Silver… light? My mind started to wander to the reasons why moonlight is blueish white when the sun’s direct light is golden yellow, but the voice would not allow the pupil to stray from the lesson for long.
“The moon… is gilt… with silver.”
Right. Right. Okay. I’mma take these words literally, then. The moon is gilt with silver. In my mind’s eye, I saw a dark expanse that I knew to be the night sky, and a disk shaped void in the darkness. Blacker than black at first, a thin layer of purest silver was gently hammered to it by unseen forces. The manner in which the silver was applied made the disk look like it was advancing through the phases of the moon from New Moon to Full Moon in minutes.
“The moon is gilt with silver.” This time, I caught myself speaking the words along with the voice. Our voices made a pleasant harmony that sealed the silver disk of the moon. It gleamed in the night sky and gave me the warmth of a job well done.
I was suddenly aware that I was standing on the Earth at true midnight. The Sun was on the other side of the globe. The lunar disk was just barely out of the Earth’s penumbra. It made for a very bright full moon.
As I stood and watched, the appearance of the lunar disk changed. It remained perfectly still, keeping the same relative angles between it, me, and the sun, but the face of the disk began advancing through the phases of the moon. From Full Moon to Waning Quarter to New Moon to Waxing Quarter to Full Moon and continuing in that endless cycle. The silver of the disk remained intact, only what portions was allowed to reflect light to me was changing.
“The moon is gilt with silver. His unchanging face is made mutable by means of shifting perspective. Those that see, see all.” The voice added more words to the monologue. I nodded in recognition that I heard them, and that I understood the face value of what the voice was speaking. But I knew this was a Mystery being played out before me, and truly understanding that Mystery was not going to come easy.
For the rest of the night I slept fitfully. Deep sleep would appear to me by the earth under my feet becoming a bottomless void that I would fall into. It’s not the first time, so I was not alarmed nor surprised by the gleeful grip of gravity. But as quick as deeper sleep claimed my awareness, I would either wake with a start, or open my eyes to find myself back on the night covered land.
“The moon is gilt with silver. His unchanging face is made mutable by means of shifting perspective. Those that see, see all.”
The silver lunar disk continued it’s travel of a month in a handful of seconds. The voice continued the steady repetition of the lesson. I continued looking around for some missing clue, or watching the lunar disk’s changing face.
I was reminded of Pink Floyd’s “Eclipse” after a while. To my surprise, the voice faded allowing my memory to play the track. The lunar disk slowed its rapid alterations so that a full lunar “month” was timed to two measures of the song.
When the music of the song ended, the lunar disk displayed the light of a Full Moon and ceased advancing. After the spoken part of the track ended (“There is no dark side of the moon, really. Matter of fact, it’s all dark.”), the voice spoke one last time.
“The moon is gilt with silver. His unchanging face is made mutable by means of shifting perspective. Those that see, see all.”
I had a glimmer of Understanding and my face began to glow.
Waking up stole that glimmer from me.