I thought I saw a monarch yesterday, floating on the wind between studio and stall: wings like the summer sun, pure orange fire edged in the colors of day and night.
It might have been a viceroy, but I think not; it seemed just slightly too large for the lesser gentry of the butterfly realm. A painted lady landed on the sage last night, but did not stay long enough for a photo; this morning, it’s all tiny whites everywhere.
The air is hazy, partly with the smoke of the same fire that turned the southern skies brown at sunset last night. Most of it, though, is the clouds: thunderheads on a massive scale, the kind that may well bring the promised rain sooner than the experts predict.
Less than a week off the first official day of the hot season, light still lengthening at both ends of the day, and at last, it feels like summer here.
Today’s featured work embodies both the season and its spirits — not merely the butterflies who lend their wing shape to it, but the brilliant amber orb that lights the sky for all but the fewest, darkest hours of night, as protective and transformative as any cocoon. From its description in the Earrings Gallery here on the site:
Chrysalis Sun Earrings
Dawn takes flight on silver wings, bearing the orb of a chrysalis sun. Wings summons the sun and the transformative spirit of the day with these butterfly earrings, newly emerged from the cocoon of night. Each drop drifts gently from side to side, its flared top and bottom adance in sharp relief. At the center of the wings sits a tiny amber orb, each cabochon as timeless as the light and glowing with its own cosmic fire, each set in the cool, secure embrace of a plain, low-profile bezel. Earrings hang 1-3/8″ long by 1″ across at the widest point; iolite cabochons are 3/16″ across (dimensions approximate).
Sterling silver; amber
$525 + shipping, handling, and insurance
It really does seem as though the butterfly is emerging from the amber chrysalis at the center, just like the sun that sends its silvered rays soaring across the eastern sky at dawn. It is a perfect metaphor for the season, a world having shed the last ragged robes of winter, reborn in flowering warmth and light. It’s a symbol, too, of that renewal we are granted with each sunrise — not merely a new day, but a new world in which to live again.
The light is, in its own way, our own protective cocoon, a chrysalis from which we emerge anew, with wings like the summer sun, ready to fly.
~ 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.
