Feeling Loony in Varanasi

Shoot for the moon and if you miss you will still be among the stars.

— Les Brown

The Moon has been long associated with insanity; the words lunatic is derived from Luna—the Latin name for Moon. However, to me it has been somewhat aspirational—a symbol of creativity.

So one night in Varanasi, when I saw a priest performing the evening aarti (a ritual of worship), I felt the moon was playing with my mind—stretching and expanding it to see beyond the ordinary (maybe that’s what madness is all about).

Feeling Loony in Varanasi

Is the cyclical process of the appearance and disappearance of the Moon somewhat similar to our own appearance and subsequent disappearance from the face of the earth?

So if rebirth is true, and all that soul talk is true, do the transitioning souls rest on the face of the moon?