In the throes of winter, booted feet heavy and frozen to the ground, it’s hard to imagine that we will dance again.
But we will.
Despite the bitter cold of the last four days here, we have been visited by numerous messengers, heralds of warmer winds to come. The bluebirds have returned even earlier than last year’s months-early arrival, and seem disinclined to move on in any direction. The prairie dogs have emerged from their underground warrens, blinking confusedly in sunlight bereft by icy winds of all warmth and welcome.
A week or two ago, we even had a wasp and a couple of bees, their internal clocks misled entirely by late May weather in early February.
We have had no dragonflies yet, but these early visitors remind us that spring is only weeks away, and genuinely warm weather not far beyond.
By now, winter feels punitive, as though the spirits must discipline us yet weeks longer for our failings, and all the more so after having held out the tantalizing prospect of early summer through the first weeks of the new year. It’s not, of course, except insofar as we may be said to be punishing ourselves for our failures in protecting the earth from the ravages of anthropogenic climate change. But there’s little about the last few days that feels anything like love.
And still, the spirits provide, even when we are too absorbed in our own misery to notice.
The chokecherry birds are here early also, although not nearly as prematurely as the bluebirds. They are one of the markers of spring, when that season is still in its infancy, still marked more by snow than by renewed green. They are the grosbeaks, or as my own refer to them, the bony beaks, and they make short work of the sunflower seeds on the feeder. A few weeks ago, a solitary scout arrived; the next day, he brought his mate. On the third day, another female accompanied them; on the fourth, it was two mated pairs. By the fifth, the whole clan had come, and they have returned daily since, brilliant flashes of yellow amid olivey cloaks, color that seems to call the very sun down from the sky.
Meadowlark has been here, too, and he is truly the golden herald of spring. He did not sing this time, only watched; perhaps he knew what we did not, that the weather was about to reverse itself.
Increasingly, though, the wingéd ones are returning to make their presence known, to sing, to dance, to deliver the messages with which the spirits have charged them. That is, after all, their role, so many of them: to carry the words between us and the spirits. Raptors, small birds, hummingbirds, butterflies, dragonflies . . . all fill this role at one time or another. All sing, in their own way; all dance upon the wind and the light.
And so, as the sky alternates between a wan yellow and leaden gray, as the wind howls and shrieks and rocks doors and walls, floor and roof, I am reminded anew that it is only temporary, the last furious dances of the winter season, soon to make way for sun and light and warmth, for songs and dances and messages of love.
Such ruminations, naturally, put me in mind of today’s featured works — a necklace and earrings created far apart from each other, with no notion of matching, yet entirely complementary in both style and symbol. We begin with the necklace, one of Wings’s masterworks that is the very embodiment of a spirit messenger, and also of love, from the love of the spirits to romantic love among ourselves. From its description in the Necklaces Gallery here on the site:
Messenger of Dawn Necklace
Sometimes, a piece of art transcends its intended purpose, becoming so much more than its basic function and the sum of its parts that it qualifies as a masterwork, a perfect melding of symbol and spirit. So it is with this necklace, a manifestation of Dragonfly: water spirit, protector, symbol of love, messenger of the spirits. Handcrafted of finely stamped sterling silver half-round wire, his shimmery wings textured by countless strikes of a tiny jeweler’s hammer, he arrives dressed in the colors of the Pueblo dawn. His body is formed from delicate rose quartz cabochons: seven of them, a number sacred to many peoples, and stones that some other traditions regard as the mineral embodiment of the qualities of peace and universal love. His amber eyes blaze with the fiery glow of the rising sun; he carries a glowing copper serpent on his back, traversing his wings (image shown at the link). He hangs from a hand-strung necklace of square-cut leopard-skin jasper beads in warm shades of rose and brick red and taupe and gray, tying all the hues together. The strand is backed by a series of copper-colored trade-style beads terminating in a small series of old natural green turquoise “doughnut” beads with their own copper matrix. The dragonfly pendant is 2-5/8″ long from antennae to base and 2-7/16″ wide across the wingspan; the strand of beads is 17″ (dimensions approximate).
Sterling silver; rose quartz; amber; copper; leopard-skin jasper beads; trade-style beads; green turquoise beads
$1,500 + shipping, handling, and insurance
From the moment it was completed, this necklace has been one of my all-time favorites among Wings’s body of work. As I often note, I’m one of those people who doesn’t even like pink, and yet in this instance, the rose quartz paired with the amber is the perfect combination. The hues are soft yet intense, glowing with light captured and held straight from the sky, and it’s possible to believe that the small body they form, one known to dance in the air, does indeed deliver messages from spirits more powerful than we.
In recent weeks, however, Wings added a pair of earrings to our current inventory that suits the dragonfly perfectly. They are not in the same form and shape — indeed, if anything, they more closely resemble a human figure, much like many of our representations of various spirit beings do — but they are wrought in similar shades, small dancers of the heart as well. From their description in the Earrings Gallery:
Heart Dance Earrings
In our way, every dance is a dance of the heart. With these earrings, Wings summons a pair of dancers to the circle, shimmering silver beings holding fast to a bit of icy-pale rose quartz, a stone that some say represents matters of the heart. He repeats the motif on the drops themselves, each adorned with a single hand-stamped heart at top and bottom: moving up one side and down the other, creating their own round dance and sacred hoop. Earrings hang 1-15/16″ long (excluding wires) by 3/8″ across at the widest point; cabochons are 3/16″ across (dimensions approximate).
Sterling silver; rose quartz
$195 + shipping, handling, and insurance
Sometimes, the love of the spirits seems far away, especially on cold, dark days when the wind is fierce and brutal. At such times, it’s useful to watch for what the wind brings to us, which spirits dance along its icy hills and valleys to deliver their messages — and then to listen for the message itself. Because whatever the weather, whatever the season, there is love in the message, love in the dance.
~ Aji
All content, including photos and text, are copyright Wings and Aji, 2017; all rights reserved. Nothing herein may used or reproduced in any form without the express written permission of the owners.
