My daughter, up late, says, I’m going out to look at the moonrise.

One long skinny band of cloud bends across the nightsky, luminescent with moonlight. The moon rises amber.

My daughter runs into the house for her sister. The three of us walk over the dewy grass. The world is in complete, beautiful repose, with the just-past-full moon silently rising, peepers gently murmuring, the cats in an open window watching, their little heads bent together, and all around us the fragrance of lilacs.

All winter, I’ve wondered about these lilacs — and here they bloom, better than I ever could have imagined.

The night beauty is so expansively calm it’s the best birthday present I could have desired for this turning-13 girl — an enchanting embrace from the universe cupping our home.

And then we go in to sleep.

Dead my old fine hopes
And dry my dreaming but still…
Iris, blue each spring

—Bashō