I'll Meet You On The Dark Side Of The Moon

My Granddad is on the far side of the Moon.

Well, he used to call it the Dark Side, after his favourite record that he would never stop playing, but later he found out that it wasn't dark, and that it just pointed away from us all the time.

"That's the kind of place I'd like to go for a holiday," he would say to me, then kiss the top of my head. "Nice and quiet, and if I wanted to look at my old home, I just need to pop round to the near side, and there Earth would be. You could give me a wave," he said, then he would spit on his handkerchief and wipe the chocolate from my face. I never did like the hanky.

When he would take me outside to look up at the Moon, he always said:

"In the name of the wee man," is what he would always cry out, although I wasn't sure who the 'wee man' was.

Sometimes, if it were a really bright full moon, he would shout out, "Jesus, would you look at that, isn't it just the bee's knees?" Yep, I was none the wiser too, but I think he was either telling Jesus or shouting to him because I believe Jesus might live on the Moon.

When I was eight years old, they put my Granddad in a rocket ship, a wooden one that sat on a table in a hall. But they didn't launch him into space (as I had hoped) instead they slid him in behind some curtains, and we all sang songs. I guess that's the way he would want his rocket launch to be like. As everyone sang about this and that and Granddad's pal, Jesus, I counted down, 10…9…8….the curtains closed just as I got to 'lift-off' and I knew then he was gone.

Some nights I look out the window of my room, and I say, "In the name of the wee man, would you look at that."

I know he can hear me, and I know he sometimes pops around to the sunny side to wave.

I miss you, Granddad.

Bobby stevenson 2020