When we see the shadows on the moon, we are probably looking at craters, or so we’ve been told.

Sometimes when we look, we see eyes and a mouth that looks like a big O! Last night I couldn’t see the big O but I thought I saw eyes and a nose. Maybe he was wearing a Covid mask. Moments later the man in the moon was gone. But who was that masked man?

Well, we know he arrived in the spaceship Apollo 11.

I tried to make the face a likeness of Neil Armstrong, but I’m not much of an artist.

But sometimes, when I look at the moon, I see “el conejo en la luna,” the rabbit in the moon. Aztec legends tell several versions of the story of their god, Quetzalcoatl, who was responsible for the rabbit ending up in the moon.

In one version Quetzalcoatl is still a man on Earth. He is tired and hungry from wandering and a rabbit offers himself up as food for him. Quetzalcoatl lifts him up to the moon and then brings him down again, thanking the rabbit for his noble offer and saying that for this generosity his shadow will be displayed on the moon forever to remind people of the rabbit’s goodness.

(We don’t know if he ate the rabbit.)

 

My apologies to all the bunnies out there for the lumpy, bumpy image I’ve posted. I’m sure the earthly rabbits look much better than el conejo en la luna.