The calendar says December, but it looks and feels like May.
May in a drought year, that is.
There should be snow on the ground and clouds in the sky; it should not be warm enough to wander outside with no coat, never mind without long sleeves. Instead we have yet another day that outsiders regard as beautiful weather, but we know the deadly truth of it.
And there is not a thing we can do about it.
We are at a pass that requires collective and communal action, and we already know that that will not be forthcoming. In a place where the invading population refuses to wear a mask to protect the very people on whose stolen land they thrive, there is no hope of either policy or process to protect the land. Instead, they seem determined to do the exact opposite of what is required, calling it “economic progress” while the world dies around them.
The only thing within our purview now is here in front of us, this small parcel of land that has thrived for millennia but now needs our help to keep it alive and well. At the moment, the “alive” part is about all we can do; “well” requires the cooperation of elemental forces that colonial pillage has done its best to expel entirely.
Even in these short days, growing ever shorter now, the hours of unrelieved sunlight are long and hard. The earth finds rest, if not anything like healing, beneath the blanket of night.
It’s no metaphor, although it works that way, too, especially this time of year. As autumn cedes space to what should be becoming winter, we would normally be granted the gift of fiery sunsets once more. Such skies typically travel with the seasonal extremes, summer and winter; this place has never been much for spring showers, only winds, and fall is far too clear to deliver more than a gradient glow of color. But the summer monsoons and the winter snows have always been reliable producers of spectacular twilight skies: a dark Phoenix, the storm’s Firebird, when night is born of flame.
Today’s featured work embodies the shapes and shades of these seasonal spirits and gifts — a pair of earrings manifest as the guiding forces of fire and night. From their description in the Earrings Gallery here on the site:
When Night Is Born of Flame Earrings
This is a space and season when night is born of flame, a crimson sun descending a scarlet sky before the fall of the black velvet dark. Wings brings together the scarlet sun and the jet expanse in a setting as silver and shimmering as any constellation of stars. The focal setting is all of a piece, a single backing to hold the square onyx cabochons at the center, the tiny round carnelian orbs at the top, and the paired radiant sunbursts, made by hand from sterling silver ingot, that connect them like little molten fires. Organic hand-drilled tabs emerge from the top of the setting to hold the earring wires, and from the bottom to hold the jump rings that allow the pendants to dance: hand-made repoussé diamonds, Eyes of Spirit that guide as surely as the North Star. Earrings hang 2″ in full length (excluding wires), consisting of 1-1/4″ combined settings and 3/4″ of dangling jump rings and pendants. Square bezels are 1/2″ across; onyx cabochons are 7/16″ across; carnelian cabs are 3/16″ across; ingot sunbursts are each 1/4″ across; and pendants are 3/4″ long by 1/4″ across at the widest point (all dimensions approximate).
Sterling silver; onyx; carnelian
$425 + shipping, handling, and insurance
These were the fourth of five pairs of earrings that Wings recently created in a similar classic style, an informal series of sizes and shapes and stones brought together in traditional fashion. Of the five, only this pair remains.
Perhaps they have been waiting for the season that aligns with their spirit, and Spirit knows there has been a dearth of anything like clouds to produce a fiery sunset lately.
That changed last night, when late-forming trailing bands of iridescent white began to forge a path across the western sky. These held no rain, of course, only light — but by fall of night, they had undergone a kaleidoscopic transformation, from pearl to gold to amber to copper to rose to crimson, the light behind and within them radiating out to the indigo of twilight, turning it the color of jet beaded with the silver of the first Evening Star, and soon its followers too.
If predictions hold, that may change even more in the week to come; for now, there is a decent chance of regular cloud cover and a small but real chance of snow in the forecast. It’s nothing like enough, but it would take years of dedicated reclamation work to have even the chance of approaching that point now. But reclamation occurs in the small steps and spaces, too, and as they are the only path currently open to us, we must be ready to put them to proper use whenever they present themselves.
These skies, too, remind us of another lesson that we tend to forget: that there is wisdom to be found in earth and sky themselves, and guidance, too. I wrote above of the dark as a Phoenix, rising from the ashes of the heat of the day. Earth and sky together now need a chance at rebirth, and when delivered, it will be from the storm itself. But this is the season of the storm’s Firebird, when night is born of flame, and rebirths, however small, are possible.
~ Aji
All content, including photos and text, are copyright Wings and Aji, 2021; all rights reserved. Nothing herein may used or reproduced in any form without the express written permission of the owner.
