The purpose begins to be explained, right from the beginning. "December the planets perfectly rehearsed" (2, 3). This is a metaphor for boys practicing hockey, preparing for the big game. The "earth's shadow cast against the night sky like the outline of a hand projected onto a screen" (4, 5, 6). The mention of a screen refers to watching hockey on television and preparing to perform yourself. Nothing is quite like preparing for something that you're devoted to. "A friend and her teenage daughters" (9) is a metaphor for "A friend and his teenage boys. The author tries to emphasize the relation between a woman's love for astronomy and a mans love for hockey. There is gravity that's involved in both. Whether there's a scientific explanation or not, it doesn't matter sometimes. Whether we can explain it or not, it's there and it's real. There's a charisma to life that almost always makes this true. This is what the author is trying to put across. This is true in the case of hockey. The two are very similar.
             In the poem, the author writes; "their breath the colour of surf" (14). The cold night air, ensures that both the women in the backyard, and (I imagine) in the case of the boys out on their ice rink would both have to be "wrapped in scarves and thick coats" (13) to keep warm.
             One metaphor of this poem that especially drew my attention was when the author wrote "the heat of their bodies strung to the pull of the moon" (16, 17). For the female and her teenage daughters, the moon is what draws them. But the moon is a metaphor for the puck, and the game in general.
             "[How] they hold their places as the planets align" (21) is a very striking part of the poem. The planets alignment corresponds to the boys waiting for "just the right time" to make a good play. The girls, are similarly wai...