Story Postcard: The Moon's Secret

Maya stands at the edge of the clearing, in a place between evening and night, forest and ink blue skies. The handful of bright yellow stars aren't warm enough to take the chill out. They seem to move around the sky, tip-toeing around the big round, placid disk of a moon, whispering secrets and spinning reams of mist. Mist, as white and gossamer as the spirits in the forest. As Maya looks up at the moon, pale and silver like a large mother-of-pearl pendant, she catches him smiling down at her. The kind of smile that has a story behind it. "Maybe there's a secret in this forest. Maybe the story everyone whispers to each other about this forest is true," wonders Maya, suddenly feeling cold.

Art and Story by Chandana Banerjee

Illustration Friday: Sky

'Searching' - water colour, pencil colours and pen-and-ink illustration on ruled journal paper by Chandana Banerjee

Story Postcard - Maya's Search

The lights meld together - a mix of shooting stars and aurora borealis, dreams and questions, horizons and bits of coloured sky. Little Maya stands at the helm of the world, between wonder and journey. "What am I born for?" "What is my purpose in life?" "What is it that I want to do here?" "What do I want to be?" "How do I want to make a difference?" Questions swirl around her, whooshing in answers in the form of bolts of tinted light and twinkling stars.

There's light, there's shadow. There are blues and there are yellows. Violets meld with green. Questions fuse with answers. Love with life. Laughter with tears. The sky is a like a big jigsaw puzzle, like a show-and-tell of thoughts and stars. There are words scribbled in magician's ink, playing hide and seek with Maya. She mixes up the lights of the aurora borealis with her hands, sorting through the layers of coloured sky. She tries to hold the words, catch them with a light-catcher.But words are elusive. They are like butterflies, nimble and beautiful. They leave a trail of stories and a sprinkling of thoughts. Something for Maya to remember.