"A Dragon gulped the shining moon"

"An eclipse of the Moon (or lunar eclipse) can only occur at Full Moon," explains MrEclipse.com in his helpful "Lunar Eclipses for Beginners, "and only if the Moon passes through some portion of the Earth's shadow. The shadow is actually composed of two cone-shaped components, one nested inside the other [click on link for diagram]. The outer or penumbral shadow [visible around circumference above] is a zone where the Earth blocks part but not all of the Sun's rays from reaching the Moon. In contrast, the inner or umbral shadow is a region where the Earth blocks all direct sunlight from reaching the Moon." We caught the moon in mid eclipse as it hung -- as if suspended from the spacious firmament on high -- over our own airy Mystic River Bridge early morning. Note streak of dayglo pink, lower left, a record of bridge traffic movement during the extended photographic exposure it took to grab the ambient light from the murky dawn.

We got up with the chickens -- and the cats -- to catch the totally awesome total lunar eclipse this morning:

A Dragon gulped the shining moon last night,
And in the blackness I saw what I had missed.

          --Han Shan Te'-Ch'ing, 1600

It was well under way around 5:35 by the time we gave up on featureless, out-of-focus hand-held efforts and got down to business, setting up our tripod on the front porch, where we caught the image above of the vanishing orb framed by the Mystic River Bridge as topographical model (see below) of Fuji.

This 3-D digital topological model of an unidentified cathedral by Vinod Srinivasan of Texas A & M University illustrates our comparison of the Mystic River Bridge's open architecture to a topographical model of Mount Fuji.

"Mt. Fuji in clear weather with a southerly breeze" (Ink on paper/woodcut, c. 1831, Rijksmuseum Amsterdam) by Katsushika Hokusai, one of the first Japanese artists to gain widespread renown in the West. Born in Edo (now Tokyo). "he is considered one of the outstanding figures of the Ukiyo-e, or 'pictures of the floating world' (everyday life), school of printmaking." His prints were "enthusiastically collected by such impressionist artists as Claude Monet, Edgar Degas and Henri Toulouse-Lautrec, whose work was profoundly influenced by them."

Mount Fuji in our own front yard.

Update: Miss Kelly links with music to our ears:

Sissie got up wicked early Tuesday morning and captured a wondrous photo of the lunar eclipse, perched above the Mystic River bridge. Gorgeous.

As we wrote Miss Kelly in our own comments, "The artist's eye never sleeps."

Comments

[goomp]

The early bird catches the unique photo. A cathederal and a mountain from a Cheslea-by-the-Sea porch. Also thanks for the link describing the details of an eclipse of the moon.

[miss kelly]

Stunning photo, Sissie. Thanks for getting up wicked early, with the artist's eye fully functioning.

[Sissy Willis]

Miss Kelly: The artist's eye never sleeps. :-)