Today is absolutely beautiful: clear, bright, warm, still.
It’s so beautiful, in fact, that I keep forgetting that it’s Wednesday and not Saturday — our schedules have been so chaotic lately that my internal clock cannot keep up, and my sense of time is completely shot — and with a day so lovely, it seems that surely it must be the weekend already.
That will probably change this afternoon, of course. Oh, the mercury will continue to rise, but the winds likely will, too. Already, the gorgeous giant band of lenticular clouds that spread from north to south behind the eastern ridgeline has been driven mostly beyond our sight. And if yesterday’s patterns are any guide, we have plenty of trickster winds waiting in the wings for their cue to blow up violent gusts, driving spinning dust devils and walls of dirt across the fields.
For now, though, it is warm and quiet, and the embers of this morning’s early fires in the woodstoves are sufficient to ward off the chill indoors.
And in this season when wildfire poses its greatest dangers now, it reminds us what a gift fire can be.
Today’s featured work, a personal favorite, is manifest as fire’s creation: not from any supernatural force, but from the elemental powers that are inherently a part of our world. It’s a recognition that of sun and earth is fire born (and yes, from more reckless sources and other forces, too), and that its medicine is an elemental part of our own survival. From its description in the relevant section of the Bracelets Gallery here on the site:
Of Sun and Earth Is Fire Born Cuff Bracelet
Jewels remind us that of sun and earth is fire born, a gift of glowing medicine. With this cuff, Wings summons the colors and shapes of land and light to attest to this truth, in a single outsized gem banded in the shades and shapes of the flames. The band is formed of two separate strands of sterling silver triangle wire of a decently heavy gauge, all sides equilateral with a perfect sharp apex. Each strand’s two upper sides are stamped in a positive/negative repeating pattern of radiant triangles, as though each is itself a fiery bolt of lighting, met and cinched at either end, spread wide apart at the top. The center of the band holds the focal a simple scalloped bezel edged in twisted silver, inside of which rests an extraordinary oval cabochon of tiger iron — tiger’s eye layered in iron compounds and fused with jasper and hematite, its earthy chatoyant brown shades lined with brick red and trailing bands of the brilliant golden glow of the sun. Band is 6″ long; each strand is 1/4″ wide per side (three sides per strand, triangle wire in an equilateral triangle); conjoined strands, together, are 1/2″ wide at ends, 1-3/8″ across at widest point of center separation; setting is 1-5/8″ high by 1-1/4″ across at the widest point; cabochon is 1-3/8″ high by 1″ across at the widest point (all dimensions approximate). Other views shown above, below, and at the link.
Sterling silver; tiger iron
$1,100 + shipping, handling, and insurance
Scroll up and look at the first photo: The hematite, a stone of earth and heat and included over time on a geologic scale, looks like waves of silvery water. Water, of course, plays a role, too, but that’s true of all of the elemental powers — they all conspire as much as they contend, their work in collaboration and opposition together creating a world in which we can live and thrive.
Look for a moment, too, at the metallic coolness of the stone in the top photo . . . and then look at the same stone below:
Here, the cabochon positively blazes with the colors of flames. The difference lies in the external lighting: The photo at top was shot in natural light, only the sunlight filtering through the studio window to illuminate it; in this one, artificial indoor lighting added to the ambient glow.
Both are the work of fire, but the flames assume a distinctly different quality depending on the source.
That is true of literal fire, as well. It’s the difference between the confined warmth of the woodstove and open wildfire conflagration, and every point along the spectrum in between. But even wildfire has its uses; it’s part of how woodlands traditionally maintained a healthy habitat.
The problem now lies in that one small word: “part.”
The destructive behavior of colonial humankind has made such self-controlling mechanisms impossible, creating a malformed environment in which any force, once unleashed, no longer has natural checks to hold back its own damaging power. And so this world now requires even more work of us, not merely to manage what surrounds us, but to heal that which has been harmed, restore that which was exterminated, renew that which we still have with us.
This is the stewardship, but it’s also the work of relatives collaborating and cooperating in community with each other. And like we must make the work of fire now, it all must be a labor of love.
~ 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.
