October 28: Slender Moon

I spent my day in a leadership class at Cellardoor Winery in Lincolnville, its renovated new space (what used to be an old farmhouse attached to a barn) a beautiful venue for a group get-together. We enjoyed views of a mountain in the distance (Levenseller?), lingering foliage of orange and gold, the vineyard's neat rows, vast mown fields, a pond, and a rainbow-colored line-up of Adirondack chairs. After our day's class, we then partook in a delicious wine-food pairing. At one point in the tasting session, someone from the winery mentioned "body-to-body pairing," in which you combine a complex wine with a complex food to bring out the best in each. I like that phrase for many reasons and left thinking that was somehow going to be the subject of today's haiku.

This is what I was going to write about...

But then as I was driving home past Megunticook Lake at dusk, I happened to glance to my right, across the calm water of the lake. The lake's surface was so calm, and the day so cold, that I had to remind myself that I wasn't looking at ice. Beyond the still water, blue and deep, rose the dark form of Bald Mountain, with just one house lit up in its center like a welcoming lantern. And above the mountain's smooth shape hung the slimmest slender crescent of the brand-new moon. If there had been a place to stop and pull over, I would have done so. Instead, I admired the simple, iconic beauty of the scene as best I could without driving off the road (lake on one side, mountain on the other). I'm a sucker for the moon. At least half of our artwork includes the moon in some form. So I guess it's no surprise that even after spending my day looking out on the idyllic landscape of the vineyard, I'd be most inspired by the moon.

Dusk: new moon setting.
Barely there, this slim crescent
trumps the fall vineyard.