The Other Side of Midnight

Between the moon and sun lie the hours before the first glimmerings of dawn as the full moon sweeps across the sky bathing it with the waning glow of her light in the dying night. She wraps it tenderly and gently, as a mother, enfolding all of creation in her loving embrace.
Slowly, her light releases it’s hold on the dark revealing gold, and rose, and violet against the steely blue tones of first light. She is the Mistress of Re-birth…the other side of midnight.

The Other Side of Midnight

Nothing here, I'll look again
Another place, in darker light
Take a walk to journey's end
The other side of midnight.

Keep the watch, to count the hours
And hold the hands before they move,
Forever stare, from the dark black Tower
The other side of midnight.

Something sad, beyond my mind
I cannot hear, as silence roars
The madmen scream, "Who cannot find
The other side of midnight?"

Crossing o'er, the madness comes
The chaos loud, in frantic fear;
Forever means no time at all . . . .
The other side of midnight.

—Robert William McCallum (c) 1986, Dunipace, Stirlingshire, Scotland

Though I’m sure he shared it with me, I don’t recall now what my friend had in mind when he wrote this song. I know when I first laid eyes on it I was in one of those long dark nights of the soul after my husband’s death. He knew the depth of my sorrow and shared the words with me in silent understanding of my overwhelming pain. A kindred spirit. One lost soul touching another.

In the moving years since, I have come from that infernal place to one where the cycle of the night more accurately reflects where I am…a rebirth of each day and another chance to begin again this awkward path from dark to light. Once it seemed only the path to more darkness and the achingly lonely anguish that tore at my bones. The other side of midnight now leads to light, color and whimsy.
Yes, I still fall…landing on bruised and scarred knees. Yet, not as hard nor as far. I know now, with the passage of time, that it will hurt like hell…but, it WILL pass. And, I know I have connected fellow travelers still there for me to lean upon when those dark nights come again.

I am grateful for that gift of kindred as I have walked those dimly lit hours between the moon and the sun. Without them to bolster my own stubborn unwillingness to let the demon win I am not sure where my soul would live. It would survive…as it has done other marked events in my life…but would it really live? To my eternal gratitude I do not have to answer that question.

(All photos taken by and property of Outlaw Photography)