Under the Beaver Moon; Yon rising Moon that looks for us again

The Beaver Moon is the name traditionally given to the full moon that occurs in November. It originates from Native American and early colonial folklore in North America and is tied to the seasonal cycles of nature and human activity.

Moonrise, Hernandez, New Mexico, one of Ansel Adams' most famous photos. Photographed on November 1, 1941

I was rummaging through old books, looking for the poems of Gerard Manley Hopkins, and came across a beautifully printed volume of the Rubaiyat of Omar Khayyam, the Astronomer Poet of Persia. It was a strange find, as earlier that day I had been chatting with a friend whose longing for his Persian roots was clear, though unspoken. The conversation had turned to Iran, to lost worlds, to wisdom and trust—threads we both seemed to follow but couldn’t quite name.

Khayyam was there in the pages, living. Accepting life, with all its fleeting pleasure and its deep melancholia. This particular volume, the twenty-third edition, printed in 1887, held its own melancholy—nearing the end of the Victorian era, with all its beauty and decadence and ghosts. Where mom lives now, on the sea and in the sphere and memory of the Gilded Age. The spine beginning to crack, the edges of the pages just starting to yellow. Each page wreathed in a soft orange border, like twilight.

The translation, some say blasphemous translation, but not for reasons of heresy, more for its “Orientalism” for the presentation to the Western consuming mind, like mine, nevertheless hold moments of such beauty. Like this in verse:

XCIX

"Ah Love! could you and I with Him conspire
To grasp this sorry Scheme of Things Entire;
Would we not shatter it to bits - and then
Re-mould it nearer to the Heart's Desire!"

And the next:

C

"Yon rising Moon that looks for us again..."

These are all signs, and these suburbs of New York are all transition lands. If this were Middle Earth, it’s where the rangers inhabit, where there are rips in the fabric of the domains God put at odds. The city makes a poor Eden, and the wilderness is the place of banishment. Eden, now beyond the cherubim and the flaming sword of fire, is a memory under the sea.

The Royal lion hunt reliefs from the Assyrian palace at Nineveh, a dying male lion, about 645-635 BC, British Museum

The animals, if we were gone, would take no time at all to inhabit what we built. Some already do. Flying squirrels in the attic, bats in the eaves, raccoons in the bins, mice in the walls, insects in the dark. Snakes and vermin find their way in through cracks too small for us to see. There is no barrier thick enough to keep out the force that brings all living things back to dust.

My namesake, the prophet Daniel, understood this transience. Taken to Babylon in 605 BCE by King Nebuchadnezzar, Daniel lived as an exile, interpreting dreams for a king who did not yet know his place in the order of things. A healthy tree, tall and strong, cut to a stump and bound in iron and bronze. This was the dream that Daniel saw, a vision that left him terrified. It was a warning. Nebuchadnezzar, despite knowing the signs, was driven into the wilderness - a madness that reduced him to an animal, eating grass like an ox.

This is the story. It plays out endlessly. The wilderness is always near, just beyond the edge of the yard, waiting to draw us out of our constructions. It is not far, and it does not fade. These lands of exile ripple through the suburbs, presenting themselves if you have eyes to see and ears to hear. I see myself in Daniel, though it is Nebuchadnezzar I understand more. And yet, the distinction may not matter, as both walk the same edge where humility is forged, and pride is burned up.

I was awakened by the foxes again, their screams slicing through the suburban quiet. If you’ve never encountered foxes, their cries mimic something primal - like a woman’s scream in the throes of violence. For the uninitiated, it’s unnerving, the kind of sound that stirs a protective instinct - for the pets or loved ones. But I’ve come to understand their nocturnal rituals, these foxes who keep tabs on the house, always waiting for Joy, the cat, to appear.

It is a game, though not one I’d call innocent. The cats, if they get a chance, tease the foxes. They bait them into this strange duet - a call and response that grows into a frenzied crescendo, one you don’t forget. It teeters between play and something wilder. The foxes chase, Joy dances along the edges of shrubs, always just beyond reach. The dogs, on the other hand, take a different stance. The foxes are kin—caninae—but the territorial divide sharpens their reactions. The dog doesn’t join the game; his role is to rid the yard of invaders, marking every space the foxes have claimed.

Homer, Winslow. The Fox Hunt. 1910. Oil on Canvas. Pennsylvania Academy of Art.

And me? I’m the mediator. My job is not to calm the wild but to ensure that the night’s wilderness rituals don’t spill over into a chorus of annoyed, awakened neighbors. I know Joy’s game; she darts for the door with calculation. She invites this chaos, luring the foxes into the yard like a maestro of chaos, weaving mischief into the dark suburban sprawl.

A few nights ago, I stepped right on this seamless line. The dog woke me, insistent but quiet—an unusual thing for him. There were no foxes that night, no screaming. Instead, a stag stood just a few meters from the porch, poised between me and the koi pond. A young majestic buck, staring and unafraid of either me or the dog. The dog remained uncharacteristically silent. The stag watched me with a steady gaze. He didn’t flinch as I approached, nor did the dog break the spell with his expected barking. I spoke to the stag, but it didn't move and instead followed my movements, simply ignoring my proximity to it.

The suburbs are where the wilderness meets the defined order of properties.

That's where I placed Totem Domum, a golden marker at the edge of transitions. This is where I will either emerge upright after seven years of walking on all fours, or cross to travel horseback down the wilderness of a hostile land to reclaim my stolen daughter.

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