The Trefoil Muse

I am chasing the winter blues.

It’s hard to create a work of art when you are feeling under the weather.  Fever and delirium make sentences nonsensical. Your spirit seems to float away from your body – out of this world.  You feel completely disconnected. The most talented of artists use the dark times in their lives to create beauty.  It takes fortitude and resilience to recover from illness let alone create art. 

I haven’t been feeling well – not at all. 

I am not a good patient.  I do not like being under the weather, I’d rather be in it, outside in nature.

The blues are pulling at me like a magnet.  I can see them from my window. They taunt me as they dance and skip along the snow drifts daring me to catch them.

The day is early.  The sun is only beginning to rise.  I slog into my winter gear surprised that I am not collapsing under its weight and head out the door.

The air hangs softly in the distance a paler color of white than the snow lying on the ground. ‘Angel’s breath,’ I smile at the thought of it as some blue disappears with the sun’s first rays.

‘Most people chase rainbows in order to discover magic and I’m out chasing the blues. But, why limit one’s self,’ I think bemused.

I follow the lane east, there are more blues in that direction and I can watch the sunrise.

As I trudge forward, the ice beneath my feet cracks and breaks.  It makes the sound of shattering glass. A sapphire flash pierces my right temporal lobe and I realize if I walk slower with gentler movements the ice covered land will hold my weight. Plus, if I move slower the blues may not realize I’m attempting to catch them.

I am standing above the land on an ice crested drift and observing my surroundings. Pastel hues of a winter sunrise stretch before me – pink, orange, yellow, streaked with purple.  The rising sun is magical. It catches the smaller drifts below me at an odd angle so they cast shadows.  Many think that shadows are grey but I am seeing several shades of blue. Navy, indigo, and powder but steel blue is most prominent. At times, the light hits the snow and it sets off sparks of neon light like epiphanies – there then gone in an instant.  I breathe in the cool morning air reveling at the cool winter blues.  The sun’s gentle emergence and pastel colors brings the promise of a new beginning. But, chasing winter blues and capturing them are two different things.  I’m not sure how this chase will end. I am not certain I can capture the true essence of this elusive color.

I spot a large dark patch on an otherwise bluish, white landscape.

It seems so out of left field compared to the early morning pastels and white horizon with silhouettes of blue violet. The contrast is stark.

My first thought is of death.  Sadness or depression is described as having the blues.

But, the sad fact about winter is that it often brings death. It not only takes strength but resilience to live throughout sub zero temperatures during winter. Only the strongest survive, it nature’s cycle of life. 

I thought the dark patch a carcass – winter kills and buries weak or abandoned animals under plots of snow.  Normally, a hungry predator will discover the remains and dispose of them by eating or dragging them off – this is part of natural a selection. Sometimes though, an animal’s body will remain hidden until a change in weather reveals its presence.

I hear a coyote howl in the distance for its mate.  It sounds forlorn.  This predator is well camouflaged in the steely shadows of the prairie landscape so I cannot make out its lanky form. The coyote however, has observant eyes and a sensitive nose. It has discovered a free meal.  It will stop singing the blues very soon. A full stomach will make its life a feel little less miserable in the very near future.

Nature can seem dark but even as it takes life, it provides it.

Nature can heal.

But nature can also play tricks on one’s delirious mind when it is taunted with a case of winter blues then create magic from the chaos within. 

That is when I notice them racing through the shadows, heads held high and snorting frost as they gallop on golden hooves alongside the navy shadows of prairie drifts. Swirls of snow billow behind them and shimmer in the sunlight. The silver maned ice stallions could only be a dream – optical illusions – as they lunged through my feverish mind. They were sparking hope and chasing away dark patches of depression as they passionately lifted my burdens while simultaneously delivering the light of freedom for a gentler emergence into a new, healthier beginning.  I feel an ice like burn as the first of them pass me by.  My fever cools. My mind clears. The snow begins to melt.  I reach out and grab the silvery mane of the nearest stallion and swing up.   I’ll ride with these icy winged stallions to rein in the winter blues knowing I’ll never aptly capture the color.  Honestly, I’ll be fine if the blues escape me completely. Then, as if by magic, I ascend the frigid land on the back of my steed, like a Ghost Rider galloping across the sky, vanquishing blues as I capture soft pale hues of winter. When I am finished, I will let go and the chase will end.

It’s only when realism and imagination collide that true magic happens and you heal from your chaotic burdens.  The trick is to let go.

It takes strength, and staunch perseverance to survive the long dark months of winter.  The most talented of artists are able to use the dark times in their lives to create beauty; this takes courage, imagination and magic.

Read the signs Nature provides. You have the ability to truly unburden yourself and achieve freedom; this takes strength and resilience – sometimes trickery and imagination.  Life is an illusion but freedom is real. You can only start anew when you reach the end.  Let go. Emerge gently into new beginnings. Remember to walk softly, breathe deeply and fly high. Touch the magic, dream.

Thank-you for following, reading, sharing and commenting – The Trefoil Muse