It’s supposed to rain today. So far, it’s not looking promising.
Last night, the wind kicked up again, spiraling through the dark. Somewhere around the midnight hour, it strengthened into a storm, albeit one mostly of the wind itself. The only evidence of rain was a percussion of drops on the windows then and a faint dampness to the earth this morning; anything that fell on on-soil surfaces had long since dried as a result of the gale-force winds that gleefully upended everything in their path.
Dawn broke against a wall of dark clouds to the west, and there was still hope then that the forecast would come to pass, but now, at midday, hope seems fruitless: All the clouds that remain are puffy white against a clear blue, and the only all in the west is there return of yesterday’s pall of smoke from some unreported wildfire.
It should feel warm, but the wind, even light as it currently is, neutralizes such effects. We still need a fire indoors, and one is currently blazing away in the large woodstove, sufficient to warm the whole house.
More worrying is the chill that seems to envelop the whole world now, even as its actual temperatures warm beyond all records, and all safety, too. It’s not a chill that bears any relationship to weather or season; it’s the one that attends a world in its death throes, one in need of a spirit of fire in the souls of its inhabitants to save it.
That spirit is one that we all need to ignite, to nurture, to coax into open flame now, to animate our thoughts and our work and the love that drives it all. And it’s a spirit manifest in today’s featured work, a personal favorite among one of Wings’s informal but very traditional signature series. From its description in the Earrings Gallery here on the site:
A Spirit of Fire Earrings
In an elemental land, dawn and dusk animate our days and nights with a spirit of fire. With these earrings, the newest in Wings’s intermittent signature series of old-style radiant drops, he honors the central glow of the sun’s flames, as well as the warmth and illumination they provide for our survival. Each dangling drop is saw-cut and scalloped freehand, the whole evoking the shape of an Eye of Spirit, elongated into radiant light above and below. More radiant arcs embrace the central stones, each set into a scalloped bezel. The domed round cabochons are fiery carnelian, a blaze of reds at once magically translucent and mysteriously opaque. Organic drilled tabs extend from the top of each drop to hold the sterling silver coil-and-ball-bead French earring wires securely. Earrings hang 2″ long (excluding wires) by 1-1/8″ across at the widest point; carnelian cabochons are 1/2″ across (dimensions approximate).
Sterling silver; carnelian
$525 + shipping, handling, and insurance
The silverwork on this pair is incredible: Wrought freehand in vintage style, it’s big, bold, and incredible bright, the rays longer, the flares wider than on the other pairs of its kind. The stones at the center make this pair, too, highly domed round cabochons of fiery carnelian of unusual size, and equally unusual depth. Carnelian is one of those jewels that manages to seem opaque and translucent simultaneously, and these distill that dichotomy perfectly. They’re a rich flame-hued red, at once the color of brick and blood, and while the color and finish are solid enough to reflect shadows back to the viewer, they still filter enough light through the stone to allow one a glimpse into their hidden depths. These are stones of mystery, of magic, and like the fire of their name, of medicine, too.
It’s medicine this world needs desperately now: of warmth and light, of the cleansing and prayer-lifting power of smoke, of an animated and animating beauty.
As I write, the clouds have returned, thunderheads beginning to amass to north and west in monsoonal patterns now. It’s possible that we may yet be granted the medicine of rain after all.
And indoors, we shall have the animating spirit of fire to warm us, to illuminate our world, and to inspire us to the work required of us now.
~ Aji
All content, including photos and text, are copyright Wings and Aji, 2024; all rights reserved. Nothing herein may used or reproduced in any form without the express written permission of the owner.
