Mead Moon

It's June and masses of roses appear suddenly, as if in a fairy tale. Sunflowers and corn grow quickly in the cool evening air. Suddenly it's too hot for comfort during the day and I worry about bringing fish home from the store in case it spoils while I wait for my son in the playground. Suddenly it's too hot to plant those cool weather greens and I'm out in the back yard with my watering can every evening. Bees of all shapes and sizes are foraging through palettes of pollen--the dark black mascara of poppies, the rusty hue of lupin dust to the light bright spores from California lilacs. A tiny bee I cannot name lands on my beige shorts. She is up to her armpits in neon yellow pollen. A honey bee carries a dead worker from inside the hive up over the rocks and well away from the front of the hive while the queen lays over 1, 500 eggs a day. The new comb begins to fill with light-colored honey.

June sits easily in our bones. It's the restless days of school almost over and the fat strawberry horizon of summer sunsets. It's piano recitals and dusty sports days. June berries, green corn, lazy days of cold suppers and a glass of mead in the back yard. Wish you were here. Happy birthday sis!










Algonquin: When they Hill Indian Corn, Honey Moon, Hot Moon, Strawberry Moon, Rose Moon
Abernaki: Hoer moon
Choctaw: Windy Moon
Omaha: Buffalo moon
Assiniboine: Full Leaf Moon
Taos: Corn Tassel Moon
Northern Arapaho: When the hot weather begins
Cree: The month leaves come out
Kalapuya: Camas Ripe
Lakota: Moon when the June berries are good.
Tlingit: Birth moon
Sioux: Green grass Moon
Mohawk: Ripening Moon
Potawatomi: Turtle Moon
Lakota: Making Fat Moon
Wishram: Fish Spoils Moon
Anishnaabe: Strawberry Moon:
Cherokee: Green Corn Moon, Flower Moon
Full Janic: Mead Moon
Chinese: Lotus Moon
Celtic: Horses’ Moon