Moon-Earth tidal locking and the counterfactual case.

    Caption: Moon Over Forest, West Dolores River, Colorado, 1972:

      Still round the corner there may wait
      A new road or a secret gate,
      And though I oft have passed them by,
      A day will come at last when I
      Shall take the hidden paths that run
      West of the Moon, East of the Sun.

        ---J.R.R. Tolkien (1892--1973), The Lord of the Rings (1954--1955), The Road Goes Ever On: Other walking songs.

    A waxing crescent moon in the west at sunset or a waning crescent moon in the east at sunrise. No way to tell.

    The image poses a lunar phase question where there is NOT enough information to solve for the unknowns. You know the lunar phase, but NEITHER time of day NOR the location in the sky. With 2 unknown variables, you CANNOT solve for either of them.

    Credit/Permission: Boyd Norton (1936--), 1972 (uploaded to Wikimedia Commons by User:US National Archives bot, 2011) / Public domain.
    Image link: Wikimedia Commons: File:MOON OVER FOREST - NARA - 544870.jpg.
    Local file: local link: moon_crescent_forest.html.
    File: Moon afar file: moon_crescent_forest.html.