Last night’s storm produced plenty of gale-force winds but only a half-dozen drops of rain, perhaps a little more. It’s nowhere near enough to have any effect on this drought, but it gave us hope while it lasted. The forecast for week’s end looks more promising, the potential for three days’ worth of intermittent showers. We’ll take whatever we can get and be grateful for it.
These days, though, the concern is fire. Both are spirits of warmer winds here, elemental forces whose powers are as diametrically opposed to each other as they are necessary to the habitat’s healthy function. The key, of course, is balance: exactly the thing that has been lost in the winds of climate change, gathering force so furiously now.
But the old spirits are still with us, and the old ways, too, and both still speak to those who bother to listen. It will soon be time for their summer messengers to arrive with words of wisdom and guidance, words said and sung and danced upon the winds, a message of water and fire in harmony.
Today’s all-new feature, completed only yesterday, summons these spirits and their words and works together in one powerful manifestation of summer. From its description in the Necklaces Gallery here on the site:
Water Song and Fire Dance Dragonfly Necklace
Dragonfly is a messenger of the spirits, a manifestation of summer’s water song and fire dance. Wings summons the strength found in such fragile wings to carry the message safely through the season’s storm and light. The dragonfly pendant is cut freehand of a single piece of solid fourteen-gauge sterling silver and stamped similarly freehand, a repeating crescent pattern forming the segments of its lower body and long, flowing lines veining the wings in a design that evokes the elegance and natural grace of Art Nouveau imagery. The head is teardrop of perfect sky-blue Kingman turquoise set into a saw-toothed bezel; the body, a stunningly radiant rectangular cabochon of Rosarita (gold slag) nestled in a plain, low-profile bezel similarly hand-made. The bail, lightly flared at the top and tapered at the ends, is hand-milled in a feather pattern whose flowing lines pick up the veining in the wings. The pendant hangs suspended from an extraordinary strand of burnished sterling silver round beads. Bead strand is 18″ long, excluding findings; pendant hangs 2-7/8″ long, including bail, and is 3″ across at the widest point. The bail is 1/2″ across at the widest point; the turquoise cabochon is 5/16″ long by 1/4″ across at the widest point; and the Rosarita cabochon is 5/8″ long by 1/4″ wide (all dimensions approximate). Full view shown below.
Sterling silver; Rosarita (gold slag); Kingman turquoise
$1,450 + shipping, handling, and insurance
In this place, water is life, of course, blood and breath and being. That’s obvious to anyone and everyone, even those for whom this climate is a wholly new experience.
But fire, too, is life, as our peoples have always known. Here, it takes more management, more care, more respect for its power and humility in our dealings with it than the water ever will, but its work is every bit as essential to the land’s survival, and thus, to our own. Our ancestors knew well the value of harnessing its power to clear out that which is diseased and dead, knew its powers of purification and of rejuvenation, too. It’s why the colonial government has finally begun to follow Indigenous practice with regard to prescribed burns, a way of clearing out dangerous undergrowth and making space for the land and its ground cover to breathe again.
In place of the now-appropriated aphorism, Wings has always said instead that water is breath: respiration, pulse, what animates lifeblood, body, and spirit alike. The same is true of its opposite; fire cleanses and cauterizes, consumes oxygen but also lends it, and allows the world to breathe again.
And perhaps that is the wisdom these elemental spirits have to share with us in this year of so very many dangers: to remember to breathe, and to seek out the forces and powers that allow us to do so, whatever the conditions and circumstances that surround us. It’s a message of water and fire, one to teach us to honor their power, and then to use it.
~ Aji
All content, including photos and text, are copyright Wings and Aji, 2021; all rights reserved. Nothing herein may used or reproduced in any form without the express written permission of the owner.
