Based on the looks of the midday sky, the rain predicted for tomorrow may yet visit us today. The inhabitants of the daylight skies of summer at this season are most often clouds. The world regards them as obscuring of the light, but they in fact transform and deliver it in a uniquely beautiful way.
But as we move into the downward slope of summer, autumn already sending its runners ahead to visit us, it is the night sky that shows us how to light the dark.
We may not have sufficient clarity this evening to see the moon. Should the clouds part, it will not be the full moon of the image above, one in which Wings captured her dance with their veil. Now, even ascendant, she is turning her face now to other concerns, and what is visible to us will be just slightly more than her profile. Even so, her illuminating power remains.
Our Grandmother’s light inspires the first of today’s informal collection of featured works, and it’s part of why this is perhaps my overwhelming favorite among all of Wings’s current inventory of earrings. It also binds together our understanding of the links between light and flight, so often manifest in and as the spirits that light the darkened sky. From their description in the Earrings Gallery here on the site:
Ascension Earrings
The Water Bird is a figure simultaneously sacred and a part of our lives, one whose spirit has long appeared in Wings’s personal tradition and one that he has long infused into his work. These representations of this powerful wingéd being seem to belong wholly to the winter season, feathered spirits able to transcend the snow and ice and early dark, capable of ascension to the light. Cut freehand of sterling silver, each is wrought in classic symbolic shape, head pointing upward, wings arched, tailfeathers spread. A pair of hand-stamped crescents placed back to back give form and shape to the head and hint at otherworldly vision; a single arrowhead point defines the tail. Body feathers are represented by a trio of longer points, while hand-chiseled lines form the upper tailfeathers. Long, elegantly rayed mountain motifs are spread gently atop the wings, articulating the layers of covert wing feathers. at the heart of each water bird rests a fabulously adularescent oval cabochon of rainbow moonstone, perfectly translucent and refracting rays of cobalt blue, as thought each water bird carries with it the light of pure illumination as it ascends to the place where the spirits dwell. Small silver jump rings hold them securely to sterling silver wires. Earrings hang 2″ long (excluding jump rings and wires) by 1.25″ across at the widest point; moonstone cabochons are 1/2″ long by 3/8″ across at the widest point (dimensions approximate).
Sterling silver; rainbow moonstone
$725 + shipping, handling, and insurance
In this place, at any season, the night lights of our world paint land and sky with color.
In recent weeks, we’ve been granted a view of the sunset skies more often seen here in October: an inversion of color, in which the dusken fires of the western sky find their way to the clouds that backlight the peaks to the east, when the earth seems suddenly to have traded directions. It’s been ongoing for a while now, and at a much more regular rate than is usual, too. It’s a result of climate change writ small and very, very personal: Where once our monsoons were a phenomenon entirely of the afternoon, this year they are much more likely to come with the night.
And so it happens that even as the full dark of night falls across the land, we are treated to a sky still tinged with red, a black underlit with mulberry, as if to remind us that this is a season of prosperity, an earth that for some time yet will be lit by the nurturing light of abundance. In the summertime, we don’t get truly full dark until near midnight; we are at the farthest edge of the mountain time zone, and the reflected light of father Sun lingers long here. It means that the spirits of the summer night skies are often feathered and faceted, bits of silken down and diamond beads fanned out across a multihued night.
These spirits find expression, too, in today’s informal collection of featured works; so, too, do their gifts. First is one of Wings’s recent cuffs, a work of the night, and of the nightbird. From its description in the relevant section of the Bracelets Gallery:
Feathers of the Spirit Bird Cuff Bracelet
Late at night, in the world of dreams, you can feel the warmth of the Phoenix’s fire and the brush of the feathers of the Spirit Bird. With this cuff, Wings summons this otherworldly spirit and its powers of renewal into wearable form. The wide sterling silver band is hand-milled in a repeating pattern of graceful feathers, each barb and shaft articulated in sharp relief on the surface. At the center, in the embrace of a scalloped bezel trimmed with twisted silver, a spectacular round cabochon of Bird of Paradise agate unfurls feathers of fire amidst mist and smoke, Phoenix, Firebird, and Indigenous Spirit Bird at once, arising from the flames to create a new and visionary world. The cuff is 6″ long by 1.25″ wide; the cabochon is 1-3/16″ across (dimensions approximate). Side views shown below.
Sterling silver; Bird of Paradise agate
$1,050 + shipping, handling, and insurance
The second, a necklace, was created at roughly the same time, and while it does not and was not intended to “match,” it manifests in similar colors and motifs. From its description in the Necklaces Gallery:
The Flames of Night Necklace
The flames of night illuminate the dream world. With this necklace, Wings summons layers of flames from silver and stone, the dark of the night and its moonlight, too. the pendant is formed of four separate layers: two settings, one set of bezels, and one set of cabochons in graduated sizes. The setting layers are cut freehand of sterling silver, each a tripartite tendril of shimmering flame pointing downward, the base layer rounded on all edges save the point, the upper layer more geometric, linking two diamonds and a teardrop in descending sizes. Three plain, low-profile bezels sit at the center of each layered shape, and each is set with a highly domed square cabochon turned at an angle to form an Eye of Spirit: at the top, the wide deep onyx of night; at the bottom, the tiny lunar glow of a rainbow moonstone; and linking the two, a blood-red carnelian as the illuminating fire of visions and dreams. An organic sub-bail extends from the top of the pendant; the bail itself is formed of rolled and gently flared sterling silver pattern wire imprinted with a lyrical Art Nouveau floral pattern; the entire piece is gently buffed to an antique polish, a near-white just a shade off Florentine. The pendant hangs suspended from a brilliant, tightly linked sterling silver snake chain. Pendant is 2.5″ long (excluding bail) by 1-1/16″ across at the widest point; onyx cabochon is 3/8″ across; carnelian cabochon in 5/16″ across; rainbow moonstone cabochon is 1/4″ across; bail hangs 3/8″ long; snake chain is 19″ in total length (dimensions approximate).
Sterling silver; onyx; carnelian; rainbow moonstone
$975 + shipping, handling, and insurance
Sometimes, of course, the flames of night become literal.
Wings captured this image many, many years ago: the so-called Hale-Bopp comet, a streak of icy flame arcing across the sky. At this season, we also have smaller but denser collections of such flames in the Perseid meteor showers, now past their peak but still visible, should one happen to be awake and out of doors when the clouds have cleared to reveal the full jet blanket of the night.
For the moment, the clouds have moved in and moved together; there is the distant roll of thunder in their ranks. We may have no clear skies tonight.
No matter. The spirits that light he darkened sky will still be there, still doing their work, still granting us their gifts.
~ Aji
All content, including photos and text, are copyright Wings and Aji, 2019; all rights reserved. Nothing herein may used or reproduced in any form without the express written permission of the owner.
