The Flower Moon
May's full moon
Abundance, blossom, fullness
The May full moon, when the northern year is unmistakably in flower. Both Flower Moon and Milk Moon appear in the 1937 English list, and Milk Moon in particular is transparently European — it echoes the Old English name for May as the month of three milkings. This is one of the entries where the list is not disguising anything: it simply is an English name.
Where the name actually comes from
The honest attribution
In the 1937 Maine Farmers' Almanac list as an 'early English' name, alongside Milk Moon — both plainly European in flavour.
Also called: Milk Moon, Corn Planting Moon, Hare Moon.
How it tends to be kept
- Traditionally the month of full blossom across the northern hemisphere
- Milk Moon recalls the Old English month of three milkings, when cows calved
- Many people mark it as the year's most generous moon
Questions the month asks
- What is in bloom in my life right now?
- What am I giving freely, and does it cost me?
- What would I like more of?
Prompts are invitations to notice, not assignments — tradition offered as tradition.