At first glance, our world this morning looks green and gold, with just a hint of a hot blue sky.
Look longer than a moment, and the truth shows itself: the green growing sparser by the day as drought settles in again, the gold a mix of leaves already fading (or never fully greened) and the particulate haze of wildfire smoke.
We need water, and badly now.
We have needed the sun, too; this week’s weather was marred by lows plunging below the freezing mark, two days running. The tomato plants froze, as did the first rose. The weeping willows have still not fully leafed, and the some of the evergreens are already browning. Even the red willows refuse to grow, with more brown bare stalks among the stands than we have ever seen here. Even in our deepest drought two summers ago, the red willows managed to survive in the land of their name, but that, it seems, is no longer a given.
And yet . . . .
And yet, the one “dead” aspen, “killed” by those drought conditions two years ago, has, following the second night of sub-freezing lows, suddenly begun to leaf. Only in small patches, you understand — a few on a low branch here, a few more there. But the leaves are emerald green, bright and soft and wholly alive.
It’s enough to make one believe in miracles.
And the land needs miracles now, no question.
We are hoping for one this day: the rain denied us yesterday, reforecast once again for this afternoon and evening. If recent trends hold, it will deliver a mix of storm and light, a hot and thirsty land kissed by rays of sunlit rain.
Today’s featured work captures the rays, the rain, the sun, and all the shades of the summer sky into a pair of traditional earrings wrought in blues and greens and golds. These were created, as the description makes clear, at summer’s end, but their shapes and shades work just as well for summer’s beginning, too. From their description in the Earrings Gallery here on the site:
Sunlit Rain Earrings
Summer’s end is the season of sunlit rain, of cloud-webbed turquoise skies and golden light filtered through the drops. With these earrings, Wings pairs Skystone and citrine to invoke the illuminating power and medicine of the last of the monsoons. Each dangling drop is formed of a triangular cabochon of richly-hued turquoise, likely from Arizona’s Turquoise Mountain, each a graceful blend of sky blues and emerald greens, infused with shimmer gold- and bronze-colored matrix. Each sits in a scalloped bezel trimmed with twisted silver, poised above three round citrine cabochons — translucent like the rain, glowing like tiny suns. The backing for the citrine cabochons and the bails through which the jump rings at the top attach all extend organically from a single piece of silver, cut and filed entirely freehand; the drops dance from sterling silver wires. Earrings are 1.5″ long by 3/4″ to a 7/8″ across at the widest point; citrine cabochons are 3/16″ across (dimensions approximate).
Sterling silver; natural blue-green American turquoise (likely Turquoise Mountain); citrine
$775 + shipping, handling, and insurance
As I look out the window this morning, our whole world seems aglow with the the colors of this work, turquoise sky and surface greens awash in a haze of golden light.
Never mind that the haze is a brutal mix of cottonwood pollen and a pall of wildfire smoke from the west; despite its dangers, it produces an effect of ethereal beauty and magic.
Perhaps we shall be granted a bit of further magic before this day is out: the miracle of our own sunlit rain, rays of water, and of light.
~ Aji
All content, including photos and text, are copyright Wings and Aji, 2020; all rights reserved. Nothing herein may used or reproduced in any form without the express written permission of the owner.
