Sister Moon

This is one of a series of songs Sting has written that could amount to an theatrical musical of Anne Rice's "Interview With A Vampire." "Nothing like the Sun" is a reference to Shakespeare, he notes in the liner notes of said album, but this is kind of a sequel to "Moon Over Bourbon Street." I'd personally like to see Sting work more in this direction; his devotion to the love song is admirable, but I love most of the songs he's inspired to write in response to art, politics and the human condition.

This is a lovely analogy—seeing the moon as a sister rather than just an orb circling the planet, suggesting the man of the song would spend long hours meditating on her silver light—different because we usually see the moon’s face as male. I’ll agree with mark36 that the song sounds like something Louie or Lestat might have sung. Great song by a very talented songwriter.

The line from this song “my mistress’s eyes are nothing like the sun” is from a Shakespeare sonnet and appeared again as this album’s title: “Nothing Like the Sun”. Sting dedicated the album to his mother who died in 1987 but since the album was also released in 1987, chances are he didn’t have time to actually write too many songs for her. I’ll guess he was thinking of Trudie and saw in her some similarities to his mother, who he loved and admired. That “she doesn’t care what he does” suggests—realizing of course that positively everything!! can be over-analyzed—he found Trudie able to hold him more loosely than his previous wife had and this is not a criticism of either woman. It could have been for a number of reasons and despite his delight in this, not caring at all what a lover does has been known to create havoc in a number of lives and they had their difficult times with this according to interviews. The important part is he felt happy with her while his life was spinning slightly out of control. “I’d go out of my mind, but for you.” The line “My hunger for her explains everything I’ve done” can mean his acknowledgement that passion for her had him leaving his wife and children behind and although not judging them in the least, he seems to want to liken them to a vampire couple—doing what passion propelled them into even if it didn’t look quite so pristine and innocent to onlookers.

Hmm... sillybunny, you said "we usually see the moon’s face as male". Where? In Sting's songs? Cause it's always feminine in mythology. And I've always been a bit confused as to why sting chose that particular sonnet. It was sonnet 130, and basically talks about how William loved a woman completely, fully and purely, even though she was a very ugly lady. The whole piece is humorous, in a rude way. So, was Sting thinking of his mother or Trudie? Or was it a moment of madness/fun? I don't know. Anyway, this song does have a certain something that makes you love it, no matter what it's about: vampires, women, whatever.

After years of listening to and loving this song and album, it occurred to me that "her eyes are nothing like the sun" meant that he could gaze at them forever without turning away like we do with the sun. It matches what he says in the first verse when he says he would gaze at the moon the whole night through. I did some research later and saw that it refers to a sonnet with an entirely different meaning. I wonder which meaning Sting implied?

This song simply means that he has two women. One is like the sun, who's his wife, the other is like the moon, who's his mistress (sister moon). He's totally and completely in love with his mistress, who's nothing like the sun. Sister moon gives him warmth and comfort. He says he'd go out of his mind if it wasn't for her, and he just doesn't care.