The Sun and the Moon

By Jill Serron

From the beginning of time, the Gods have been dissatisfied with the world they created. Over and over again they destroyed it, sending floods to drown it, fires to burn it, plagues to devour its inhabitants. This time, the Gods were so angry that they sent a great wind, which blew everything away and extinguished the flame of light in the universe.

In darkness, the Gods held council. "How shall we go about creating a new world?" they asked each other. But they all knew that in order for a new world to be created from the darkness, there must first be a sun. And the only way for a sun to be created was for a God to sacrifice their eternal life.

None spoke up for a long time, until finally a brave God broke the silence, proclaiming, "I will sacrifice myself to light this new world."

Immediately his lover cried out for him to reconsider. "Someone else may take the place," she begged, but he had made up his mind.

At the time of the ceremony, the two embraced for the last time as he made preparations for his transformation. But as soon as they pulled away from each other, before he could even think, she took his place, and burst into a blinding light, glowing and rising up into the sky. He watched helplessly as she slipped away from him.

In his anguish, he followed her, also becoming a sun, and copying her ascent.

Now the rest of the Gods didn't know what to do? Two suns? One world could now be lit by two. They looked at one another, and then back up to the sky.

High up in the air, the two lovers spoke.

"My love, how could you give yourself up like that?" he begged of his lover.

"I had done it because I could not bear to imagine living forever looking up at the sky and having no way of reaching you." She paused. "So I took your place, or at least I tried to."

"My darling, I felt the same way when I watched you float away from me," he told her, "and although a world may not have two suns, I will stay forever with you." She looked confused, and he continued, taking her hands. "So as I gave you my heart, so I give you my light."

She grew in size and brilliance, rising higher as his light passed to her, and he became the moon.

But as much as the moon needs the sun to exist, they cannot be together. They pledged their love to each other as the other Gods brought into being the new world, and it was to be called Earth. Countless creatures sprung up to fill it's land and seas and air. The Sun and the Moon smiled down on their little world.

As they drifted further and further away, the Sun cried out that they would be together again, that at the end of time they would burst together into a thousand stars, and fill the universe with the light of their eternal love.

And so they circled around each other for the rest of time.

The inhabitants of Earth sometimes smile up at the heavens when the Moon sometimes comes back during the day to steal a kiss from the Sun, eclipsing her if only for an instance, as a small reminder of the perfect infinity which awaits them.

(Adapted from a Mayan legend of the origins of the Sun and Moon)