We are now in the shadow of the eclipse itself, so to speak, the moon having crossed the midpoint of the sun on its journey across the sky. For us, this has been a morning not of celebration but of quiet reflection, one not of frenetic spectacle but of spiritual renewal.
For our peoples, an eclipse is not something to be treated casually.
This was not the little death as a kind of ecstasy, in the way the dominant culture understands the phrase. It was, nonetheless a little death . . . or perhaps, depending on the perspective from which one views it, a very big death indeed: Father Sun’s momentary demise, eclipsed by the moon, and a few fraught moments awaiting his rebirth.
In some indigenous cultures, it is a time of potential danger, a time to remain indoors, unexposed either to light or to shadow. In others, it is a call to action, with some community members charged specifically with aiding in the sun’s rebirth, bringing light in the form of fire to help coax the greater light back into being. For still others, it is a time of great medicine, of visions and dreams and eternal mysteries.
And perhaps above all, it is a gathering of spirits.
Here, it was not only the spirits of sun and moon who came together. This morning, a few minutes before its occurrence, marked the return of the Bluebird Clan. They are perhaps a bit early, although not by much; they normally appear around the end of August and remain until mid- to late September. As we approach the end of the gathering season for many traditional peoples, we enter the gathering season of animals and birds, all intent on preparations for surviving the winter to come.
But this day was different.
For a week or two now, we have had a bluebird here, another there, a small group flying overhead or alighting atop the aspens momentarily. But their numbers have been few and their appearances far between.
They arrived today, whether by serendipity or synchronicity, or both, with the visible start of the eclipse: a clan of blue-feathered spirits of air and sky, gathering amid the otherwordly change of the light. The change was instant, the light suddenly dimmer above and yet somehow impossibly brighter here below, outlines thrown into stark and sharp-edged relief. In the beat of a bluebird’s wing, the temperature dropped by ten degrees. The air pressure seemed to build and compress, a feeling of anticipation hanging in the air like a tangible thing, near and solid enough to touch, to hold in one’s hand.
And as I went about my work, a bluebird flew just barely overhead alongside me, headed northward, when it suddenly noticed me, wheeled in midair, and returned to alight upon the fence where I stood, some mere two or three feet away. It settled onto the wood, turned its face directly toward mine, looked directly into my eyes, and began to speak. I don’t know what it said, but its message will come clear when the time is right; of that I have no doubt. After speaking directly to me for a few moments, it lifted its wings slightly, stood, wheeled again, and continued on its northward journey.
Twenty minutes later, the moon crossed the sun, and while it was invisible to us here, its effects were not: a shortening and darkening of shadows and light, a cooling of the air, an electricity in the atmosphere as the the spirits gathered for one of their own . . . as the light went out and was reborn, Grandmother Moon presiding over Father Sun’s little death and his great rebirth. And through it all, the Bluebird Clan, small air spirits in the color of the sky, bore witness.
This night will be the new moon, Grandmother’s own rebirth. We have seen all of her that we shall see for this day, and in truth, still nothing would have been visible to the naked eye, had we safe means to look. But she will grow in strength and light in the days and weeks to come, just Father Sun has begun to do now.
A gathering of spirits is a time for renewal, and I suspect that was Bluebird’s message. This is our time to ensure that we, too, grow in strength and light.
~ Aji
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