Swan Bones: Freedom & Becoming
The Art Witchery of Shapeshifting, Spells for Flight, & Reclaiming our Shape
Mysticism
"Spontaneous, vibrant, primeval - this is our mystical, archaic Self that connects us to the origin of all things. It is a spiritual reach toward the universal, cosmological dream mythology that reintegrates us into the truth of ourselves. It is the discovery process of the soul through the symbols and narratives of the supraterrestrial that take us on a flighted journey - the disentangling flight from our earthbound selves - to deepen and savor the mystery of life.”
-Supra, The Hidden Path of an Oracle
The sun felt the hottest on the dock. Even the island wind wasn’t enough to subdue it. I licked ice cream off my fingers, and rainbow sprinkles scattered into the bay. Water lapped against the shore rocks, and rockweed danced in the current. Even with the sun bouncing its white light off the ripples, the water looked cool, which made me feel hotter as my thighs sizzled beneath the wood planks. While my bare legs dangled off the dock, Swans nipped at my toes…
In the story of “The Swan Maiden”, her feathered cloak is stolen by a hunter, grounding her, forcing her earthbound. She is stripped bare of her swan skins' cloud-white feathers - never to face the sky again. He makes her his wife, and she lives her life with him “lovingly” - so the fairytale goes. Years pass, until he finally presents the Swan Maiden with her feathers from her formative shape, and upon touching them she turns back into a swan, disappearing into the sky, never to return.
Air
“It does not grasp at us, instead, it generously brushes ahead of us, opening the door to life and letting us pass through.”
-Supra, The Hidden Path of an Oracle
My thoughts have drifted in and out of this tale for years. I have wondered if there is another swan maiden, one whose wings have never felt the freedom of the wind at all. This maiden has no memory of flight because she has never flown - and instead wades in the water of her mind with an indescribable longing. Stretching her delicate neck to the sky, yearning for an aerial experience that is as woven into her design as the ability to breathe. I wonder about her. Captivity is her only knowing.
If she were to find her feathers and place a hand upon them, where would she go? Who would she be?
I watched my young daughter grow alongside the cygnets of a mated pair of Swans from spring to autumn. We watched them with our toes in the sand, we watched them from inside winter coats, I watched them bob behind their parents as my daughter learned to walk. I shapeshifted without noticing, and behind my new name (Mother), I could feel the changes inside of me without thought for my becoming. Feathers sprung out from my skin like foreign objects, and I didn’t know what to do with them.
“Long after she is dead, a mother’s bones will show that she has borne a child. Motherhood marks us forever.”
Lisa Marchiano, Motherhood
In the ancient Japanese tale “The Crane Wife,” a man rescues a crane shot down by hunters, who later disguises herself as a woman, and becomes his wife. The man confesses he has no money, so behind closed doors The Crane Wife plucks her feathers and weaves them into the finest silk to sell. Little by little, feather by feather, she begins to wither away as each night passes, sacrificing herself to keep them fed during the cold winter. The man, concerned for his ailing wife, sneaks into her room despite her orders to never enter and there he discovers her true identity. She flies away, and never returns.
I was a little girl with swans nipping at my toes, watching them with an unknown reverence. In womanhood, I discovered a pain I never knew was there. I lost something I didn’t know was lost. If I were a swan maiden, I wouldn't have known it. Something or someone was always demanding I reshape and contort my form into something quiet or smooth - like clay. I plucked myself bare, stifled in a prison of my own making; aground and tamed.
"The swans tell me that shape changing is easier when your own shape does not quite fit."
-T. Kingfisher, the raven and the reindeer
I’ve been on a quest to find the feathers torn away from all the iterations of myself, each precious piece that was lost to the fire or buried in the earth. My desire is to find them and reclaim my true shape, wherever they are or however they have alchemized. Witches know that memories survive in the ashes and that messages are written in bone.
I have been scavenging, looking for those precious remnants so I might return them to the places where I’ve become bare, as bare as winter’s bones; the leafless limbs of the trees.
Was it fear that unfettered them in the first place? I often find myself afraid of endings, afraid of change. But the life cycles of the earth show us not to be afraid. I find hope in the sliver of light after the dark moon, in the quiet awakening of a seed, in the unfurling of the leaves - all around us, underfoot and overhead we are palpated by death, sleep, and rebirth. Life is reborn in the dark. In my state of uncertain slumber, I’ve sought to find creative kindling before I too, wither away.
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The story of the Crane Wife makes me think of the sacrifices mothers make for their families.
I have run on empty many times. Plucking feathers so that others may be nourished.
I have found that we can be sustainable by nourishing our bones. Our vitality continues to flow when we will our own cups.
Thank you. This brought up many good points and areas of focus within me.