The lights are out; the tree is down. Twelfth Night is past, and Epiphany, too.
It is a new year by any measure, and it’s time to get down to the business of winter.
The weather seems to agree, although you wouldn’t much know it at the moment. To south and east and most of the north, the skies are clear and bright, nothing but the undulating peaks to interrupt the vastness of their turquoise expanse. To the west, however, is another story. It looks like a small collection of wispy and delicate clouds, but those who know how to read the skies recognize it as the birth of the next young storm.
We are supposed to get snow tomorrow tomorrow, courtesy of a fast-moving system expected to be both brief and harsh. We pray and we hope for the best even as the ravages of drought have now taught us to expect the worst, and we prepare accordingly, just in case the forecast proves right.
Tonight might be a good night for an offering, too.
It’s our way, to make an offering when we give thanks, or when we seek a favor of the spirits. It’s customary, too, to leave one out on special days, a bit of a holiday meal to be shared with the spirits of the ancestors who might wish to visit and know that they are remembered. Today’s featured pair of works are the tools of such traditions, a spirit bowl and plate in miniature, fired from the red-gold earth of this place and manifest in the slate blue and shimmer of offerings in the night. From their description in the Other Artists: Pottery gallery here on the site:
Three of Taos Pueblo’s potters create affordable miniatures on a regular basis. All are fashioned in the traditional way from the Pueblo’s iconic micaceous clay: The tiny pots, bowls, and ollas are all hand-coiled in the same manner as full-sized pieces, their only ornamentation the glimmer of the native mica, and fired to varying finishes. The classic bowl and fluted plate below are by Olivia Martinez. Fluted plate is 1″ high by 3″ across; bowl is 1″ high by 2.25″ across (dimensions approximate).
Micaceous clay
$30 each + shipping, handling, and insurance
Olivia’s work is always beautiful, but of all the miniatures we’ve ever carried (and over the years, that’s been a lot), hers have always been my favorite. The bowls are beautifully spherical, the fluting of the plates delicate and even, the proportions perfect and the finish ultra-fine. These two, the last in our inventory, are no exception. Both are perfect representations of their full-sized counterparts, made of the very same clay, fired in the same manner: red-gold indigenous earth; firing cloud the slate blue-gray of a dusken and stormy sky; mica gleaming with all the shimmer of snowflakes and starlight.
And they are perfect for the small offerings of ordinary daily life — a way to set out a little tobacco or corn pollen, that the spirits may see and know that we remember them, and honor them, too.
For now, we have more work to do. It’s still the dead of winter; the days are short and the nights long, and there is much to do before tomorrow. But this evening, perhaps we will set out a little extra food, held safely in old bowls and plates that will glow with the light of the setting sun, and reflect the slate blue and shimmer of offerings in the night.
~ Aji
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