THE FAIRY TALE OF THE SUN WHO MARRIED THE MOON

It was several years after Margaret had married Mr Thornton, that Henry Lennox strolled through the woods of the New Forest with his son, the sunshine bathing the scene in a pool of golden light, his greying hair glinting as the rays frolicked across the landscape in their merry dance of May.

As he passed underneath the canopy of trees, their jade and fern leaves waved at him like hands swaying in the breeze, and the light which shone down from a clear blue sky winked at him as he passed beneath the branches which yawned and stretched lazily in the heat. Henry sometimes came here when the smog of London stifled his spirit and he longed to breathe in the purity of the country and bask in the unpolluted simplicity of nature, the ancient healer soothing his soul with all her hidden gems of wisdom and wonder. Today, as he listened to the birds who chirped away cheerfully in the trees and smelt the flowers as they spread their vivid arms of garlanded petals out in wide welcome as they greeted the genesis of this new day, Henry felt reinvigorated by the fresh air which filled his lungs and cast a spell of calming peace upon his unhappy heart. Although, at times, his eyes still flitted furtively to the band of black around his arm and his heart cried a clandestine river once more.

As they made their way leisurely through the long grass, he pointed to the old parsonage which sat across the fields of patchwork green.

"There, son,' said he, 'that is where the goddess lived once upon a time in days of old.'

'What happened to her?' asked the child as he strained to see, but he knew all too well, because his father had told him this fairy-tale many, many times before.

Henry sighed nostalgically. 'Well, my boy, she married a man. Not a prince in a castle, nor an ogre of the hills, no, he was just a man like you and me,' he replied, trying his very best not to let remorse taint his tone, but then again, he was pleased to note that after all this time, it was getting easier not to give way to regret, a private yearning for what might have been.

But the boy frowned in confusion. 'But why did the goddess marry him if he was just a mere mortal?' he questioned broodingly, the freckles of his tanned cheeks dimpling. 'Surely it was never meant to be,' he decreed.

Henry's eyes, which had sparkled with the fond gleam of happy memories, faded into sadness for a moment, the film of his orbs coated with the glaze which derives from a look of naked lament.

He gazed down to the ground and thought this through as he studied the fertile soil beneath his feet, for it was a question he had asked himself many times before. 'No,' he said quietly, reflectively.

'She was probably not meant to marry him since, you see, it was a strange hand of fate which brought them together. They may never have met, may never have known each other, and things could have been different for us all, you especially, my child, but out of all the people and all the places in the world, providence introduced her to him and him to her,' Henry explained, nodding his head as if to remind himself that he too ought to hear and heed the truth of this tale.

'They were from different worlds, her and he, she from the mild south and he from the bitter north, but she blew into his life like a summer breeze and brought it a radiant warmth which melted his icy heart. They were as different as the moon and the sun, but sometimes such differences tug two polar souls together and nothing can ever tear them apart, for it is written in the stars that the moon and the sun might be as different as day and night, but they need each other to survive,' he revealed, his voice melodic with the philosophy of the poets.

'And which was she?' checked the lad. 'The sun or the moon?'

Henry chuckled. 'Why the sun of course, for she is light, she is laughter, she is life, and she is love.'

As the boy tipped back his head and scrunched up his eyes, he peered up at the baking sun who reigned in all its majestic glory high in the heavens. 'The man must really have loved her,' he deduced since he thought it must take the courage of a knight in a storybook to marry something as bright and beautiful as the sovereign star.

Henry nodded his head, half sadly, half sagely. 'Yes, he did, for who could not?' he tested. 'With just one look, one touch, he was lost to her, and he would never be the same again, since he was a changed man through and through, for the purity of her love held mythical powers. And after that, their souls and spirits forged a bond and made a vow to always be together forever. So, son, it was destiny that decided for them, it was love that gave its blessing for the mortal man to win her hand and wed her heart, and so, the sun married the moon and that was that. He may not have been terribly special in the narrow eyes of the world, but to her, well, he was her world entire,' Henry described, a curious blend of admiration and angst gilding his words as they escaped his lips.

The boy thought on this for a moment and nodded. 'And was she happy, Father?' he asked with the earnest entreaty of a child, since in the end, children know that such humble aspirations are all that really matters in this life.

At this, Henry gazed into the distance, and his eyes fell upon that sheltered spot below the trees where he had come across a slumbering angel lying in the grass, his heart so full of hope, only for it to die its death before the hour was out, a fleeting optimism, but one which had beat true in his masculine breast. There, in the corner, if he looked carefully, he could see a lattice of yellow peering shyly back at him, a trellis of roses he would guess, the blossoming buds having been reborn in the shade, so it would seem.

But he was not sad, no, for he smiled, and the skin around his eyes wrinkled for the first time in weeks. Then, as the wind carried away his cares across the Helstone Hamlet, at last setting his captive heart free, Henry simply whispered:

'Yes...and so she should be.'

The End