On October 6, Annemarie Lopez joined French artist Eléonore Ozanne’s Women walking, the city, at night — a global performance uniting women walking through cities under the light of the full moon.

On 14 October, participants and anyone drawn to the idea of walking together under shared moonlight are invited to gather online and reflect on the experience.

We’re also inviting submissions for our flash fiction and poetry competition, Write about walking “In the Dark.” Open to all, it welcomes short stories or poems inspired by walking in the night. Entries close on 20 October.

What follows is a piece Annemarie wrote following the October 6 collaborative walk with Eleonore Ozanne, and presented to the Prespa international writing group (co-ordinated by Ann de Forest). Titled Woman in the Moon, it is offered as a walking inspred reflection and invitation.

Why do they always talk about the man in the moon, when she’s clearly a woman? You only have to look at her – the way she glows then hides, revealing herself by degrees. Tonight, she is full, utterly herself, as if suddenly in love with the world.

They call her the harvest moon. She appears when the last of the summer fruit is gathered, full of sweetness before the leaves fall.

A group of us women have slipped out to see her in the night. We follow her to the Victorian park while dinners congeal on counters, and children dream, and messages wait for replies. We needed air, movement, and let’s admit it, a little magic. The moon waited like the cool girl chewing gum outside the school gate. Come on then, I’ll show you something – if you dare.

At the entrance to the park, a group of men loiter. They call out to us: “You know they’ll be closing soon?” they say. We won’t be long, says one of us. The gate’s still open. The men shrug. “We were really just wanting to talk to you,” they grin. We laugh and walk through the gates without turning back, just as the cool girl instructed.

“Everyone up for a climb if they lock us in?” says one. “Sure,” says another, “I’ve climbed these fences when I was pregnant.” The moon seemed to hear us. She leaned lower, her face pale and knowing, and whispered: watch this. What was she going to show us, I wondered – does she have a werewolf lover she makes howl?

We couldn’t resist. We followed her deeper into the park, our shadows long and liquid on the grass. Her light pooling around us, cool as water. Someone began to sing an old folk song, and we joined in, even though we didn’t know we remembered the words. We sang like drunks, giddy with her light.

A security car drifted past, headlights a dim echo of the moonlight. “You’ll have to go,” they said. “We’re closing the gates.” We nodded, turned and took the side path to the canal, where the moon doubled herself in the dark water, showing us how to be two places at once.

As we turned to go, I looked up and saw her blow a kiss into the dark silhouettes of the trees, her lips purple-grey, crushed velvet. Something rustled in the undergrowth, a sound like a low growl, and she winked at me as if to say, now you know.