After more than a day of solid rain, the sun now shines with the kind of sharp crystalline brilliance possibly only at this time of year. The grass crunches beneath my feet, the wintry temperatures having turned water to ice overnight. On all sides, the peaks are shell pink, caps of white touched by the dawn glow.
For now, the world is bright, but the forecast insists that we will have more rain by day’s end, and yet more tomorrow: a truly unseasonal blessing . . and even as I write this, the clouds are moving in again. Water is life, no matter the month or season.
I tend to think of the Corn Maidens as summer spirits; it is the summer months, after all, when the corn dances are held, ceremonials in search of blessings for the planting and cultivating seasons, in hopes of yielding an abundant harvest.
Our sweet corn, of course, ripened in July and August, providing food for our table. The Indian corn is another matter; it is this month when it typically reaches the harvest stage, and it is wholly a spirit of the fall.
We were forced to pick it early this year; climate change continues to force the small creatures to seek other sources of sustenance, and this year, everything from insects to voles to a pair of chickadees seized upon the tall colorful stalks as a means of survival. Some of it did not make it to the ripening stage, but we were blessed with some good ears in a truly breathtaking array of beautiful colors: the usual purples and yellows and orangey-reds; some brilliant amber and russet ears that shine like autumn jewels; a few small garnet ears, a deeper red than I have ever seen; and one pearly blue with scattered reds and golds, the likes of which I have not seen since childhood in a very different part of Indian Country.
A small harvest, yes, but one bountiful in its beauty, and for that we are grateful. And so it brings me to today’s featured piece, a throwback to roughly a decade ago, and one of my eternal favorites.
The Mona Lisa series is, of course, a tribute to the Maidens. But about ten years ago, Wings created a smaller series of Corn Maidens, works wrought solely of silver, at a lower price point but evoking the whole body of these feminine spirits as well as the sustaining spirit for which they are named.
They were pendants, simple stylized spirit beings a few inches long, each shaped like an ear of corn pointing downward. The ear formed the body, while stem served as head and headdress; on the back, a slider-style bail permitted the wearer to adjust it, or even to swap necklaces entirely. Wings created a number of them, but this one, with its incredibly simple stampwork, was, to my mind, always the most perfect.
He used simple geometric stamps to create the face and hair: a pair of eyes, a mouth open in singing invocation, straight hair with the customary bangs, all as these spirits are traditionally portrayed. Her tablita headdress is likewise simplicity itself, a hand-cut outline in the traditional stepped pattern, with a single inverted thunderhead symbol centered at the top. A few more curves and lines, and the shawl over her shoulders and her gorget took shape.
But it was the dress that, to me, was sheer genius.
There are multiple interpretations of most symbols, some ancient and some contemporary. Some change over the years, or new meanings are ascribed to them as circumstances change; consequently, artists may use one symbol in many different ways, in a variety of contexts, and intending very different meanings each time.
This Corn Maiden’s traditional dress was so simple and spare, and yet so perfect, four lines cascading down the front in a waving pattern: Water. Specifically, running water, or rainfall.
In a desert land where water is life, where the Corn Maidens are spirits of abundance invoked for sustenance, where the rainfall is the gift that ensures the harvest, there is perhaps no greater symbolism than the rain itself.
From the thunderhead motifs of her headdress to the rain falling down the front of her dress, this Corn Maiden embodied the silvery waters that have sustained life in this place since the time before time.
Wings resisted the urge to dress it up, while recognizing that a plain silver chain would not do this piece justice. Instead, he took a long, long strand of traditional olivella-shell heishi, the former bodies of small water spirits in brown and taupe and tan and white, and looped it over and over again, turning it into a four-strand rope of shell. He then attached the pendant to one strand, a tying together of earth and water spirits in one spare and elegant tribute to life itself.
It sold long ago, to a tourist who simply walked into the gallery one day. That customer chose a being identified with summer, true, but her powers are clearly not confined to the warmer season. Wherever she is now, this first among the Three Sisters, the Corn Maiden, continues to share a bit of the life of this place, year-round.
~ Aji
All content, including photos and text, are copyright Wings and Aji, 2015; all rights reserved. Nothing herein may used or reproduced in any form without the express written permission of the owners.
