Phoenix of the Sun
Phoenix of the Sun
Copyright – J. Jane Silence 2011
In the mirror, reflected a woman, tears rolling down her face. Life seemed to so very empty and she prayed for a way to leave it. She wished with all her might to become something else. There was no light, no love for her, no bright path to follow, only sadness and the dimness of a life unrealized. As she watched her reflection, she felt a strange prickling sensation and feathers began to grow out of her skin. A moment of panic gripped her until she realized she was transforming into a bird and she would soon be able to fly away. A great sense of ease settled over the woman as she sat back and watched the slow progress of her transformation. After what seemed like hours, it was complete and in the mirror’s reflection a massive phoenix preened where once a woman stood. Her feathers reflected the lights like tiny iridescent flames in the darkness. Each perfect avian layer was the color of fire; blue beneath, red, yellow and orange atop. She fluffed up and shook her head, walked over to the window opening it with her beak and flew directly out.
Just outside her window, there was a herd of horses. One looked up as she flew overhead and whinnied his goodbye to her. A blue butterfly lit upon the horse’s back and watched her go, a tiny tear rolling down its cheek into the chestnut stallion’s mane. She looked back over her shoulder and cried out the words “I’ll return” unheard by the horse and the butterfly. They stood together, hearts melded for a moment in sorrow at her loss. She was their lady, but they knew of her broken heart and knew she had to go. They had watched her deteriorate from a young, beautiful woman to a dry, pale wisp of her former self. In the days that led up to her transformation, they feared that death would take her. Though it wrenched them to see her go, they knew it was best and that she would fly and live. She had loved them well, and they would remember her face as it was when she was young and sweet. They went about their way after she disappeared on the horizon.
The phoenix flew for days, learning her newly found skills at flying, hunting, perching and most of all the complete lack of human feelings. There was only one problem. She remembered being human, if only that could be gone too. She had the raw animal instincts of her bird self, but still had all the recollections of her former life. Try as she might, she couldn’t forget. She spent days searching for a way to forget, begging to be released from the memories. She flew over sparse pastures, fields of green, beyond the mountains and eventually came to the endless warm ocean. She’d only seen the ocean once when she was a woman. She remembered her feet in the water and feeling home. She found the perfect place and settled down for a time. Hunting and flying over the white beach became her days. A sense of contentment settled over her.
One day as she was sleepily perched in a tree on the warm island, music floated up to her ears and she went in search of its source. The mist of the ocean lit on her feathers as she flew over the sandy beach. She saw in the distance a figure playing what she recalled in her human mind to be a guitar. The music touched her somewhere just beneath her heart and she flew toward the figure with a quicker beat of wings. The figure looked up and stopped playing as she swooped down onto the beach, her lengthy tail feathers swiping back and forth as she approached on foot. His brown eyes looked at her, stunned. She bobbed her head slightly toward the guitar and he gently strummed and plucked the strings. His clear voice sang softly words she didn’t quite understand. Unbeknownst to her, a tear slowly rolled down her cheek onto the sand. A ruby sprouted from the grains and glinted silently in the sun. Tears continued to make their way onto the sand until there was a small pile of gems nestled on the beach; rubies, sapphires, diamonds and emeralds. She moved closer to the man, dropping her tears along the way. He continued to sing as she listened and cried and left a path of gems along the damp sand. A glimmer of emotion snaked its way into her heart. She didn’t quite recognize it at first, but it settled there, devotion, love, perhaps; she didn’t question. Whatever it was, it felt good so she let it be.
After a time the man rose to leave and she followed him. His footprints were swished with the “s” shaped trail of her tail following out behind them in the sand. Sometimes she would rise into the air and circle his head, dipping closer to see him more clearly. His brown eyes were deep and she peered into his soul as he looked up at her. There she saw intense love and beauty. There he hid his inner most desires away from the rest of the world. There, she grasped the intensity of his love for a woman. It was immense and so deep that he didn’t even see it in himself. This love took up every space in his being and though it eluded others, she saw it clearly. Pained was his heart as he looked up at her and held out his arm. She lit there and gripped him gently, not wanting to hurt him with her talons. He pulled her to him and put his forehead to her beak. He smelled of sand and ocean and warmth. She nibbled at his longish brown hair and he laughed out loud as he stroked her head with his hand. His voice was beautiful and it lulled her as she sat delicately on his arm. He cooed to her about how beautiful she was. How each feather was perfection and how she fit on his arm perfectly. He even murmured “I love you” a time or two. Her heart fluttered in her chest. His touch felt so warm and welcoming with a hint of heat that she recognized, but knew it wasn’t meant for her. It was simply his nature, this music man. He would travel about, always needing to be somewhere else. He would play and sing and women would love him, but his heart belonged somewhere across the miles. She knew all of these things inherently and yet she was honored to spend these small moments under his hand.
Wings beat as she rose again and flew out over the ocean to hunt. By the time she returned, nightfall surrounded him as he played and sang beside a fire on the beach. Blinking in the firelight, she watched as his fingers made the guitar sing. She watched him until dawn as he played, cried, prayed and lay in the sand to sleep. She hummed softly while he slept and she settled into the beach; the warm night passed. She curled next to him and he laid his hand on her bright feathers in his sleep. Words formed in her mind, but she had no ability to speak them out loud.
When morning came, he stirred as she rose and walked delicately down the beach. The fire ashes swirled around in the morning breeze and he rolled onto his side with one arm tucked under his head to watch her walk. She looked back over her shoulder and knew that she had to leave. There were other places she needed to go; others to see. The man looked beside him where she’d nestled next to him in the night. Glittering gems were scattered about in the sand. She’d cried them into existence and left them for him while he slumbered. What he didn’t know is that she placed a tiny piece of her heart in each one in hopes that he would carry them with him and remember their night together. Her wish was to leave him with bits of grace to ease his aching heart, if only for a little while. She loved him for a night, but she couldn’t tell him because she had no words to do so.
She traveled again, seeing the land and learning more about herself. She discovered she could gather oysters and open them with her talons and beak. She thrilled at their briny flavor and when she found the occasional pearl she would fly through the night until she found an open window of a lady’s house and she would place it delicately on the sill, leaving with it a wish, upon which the lady of the house could call in times of need.
In passing one day as she flew through a jungle, she glimpsed a white tiger that peered at her through the dense forestation. Her heart leaped a bit as she felt the tiger’s stare follow her. There was a moment where she thought she might turn around and fly back, but she kept going.
One night as she flew through an inky sky over the mountains, she heard the whooshing of immense wings above her. She slowed to see if they were approaching her or simply passing in the night. As she fell behind the sound and rose to see what creature flew above her, an enormous dragon come into view. His scales where ocean colors, bright blues, greens and pearly white, and they blinked with the reflections of the moonlight and the stars. He glowed from inside; the fire in his belly visible through his semi translucent outer body. He was quite stunning in his massiveness. Fear nibbled at her gut, but only for a moment and she flew straight up beside him so he could see her. His reptile eyes glowed in recognition. They had known each other before, in another life, in other places in time and in different forms. She swirled around his head and they flew together into the black night.
As morning brightened the sky and the sun rose in the distance they landed atop the highest mountain in the range. He lit on the ground, and she in a high tree. Throughout the night, she learned that if she flew in front of him the air from her wings ignited the fire in his nostrils. So as to stay away from the fire that intermittently burst from his snout, she stayed away from his face when she was flying. Always flying behind him, never in front, though she was smaller and quicker.
They spent their days together swirling in the air; she always avoided flying in front of him so as not to have her tail feathers singed. Eventually, there were so many flame tinged feathers on her wings and tail that flying became difficult. She started to spend time flying on her own, avoiding him. One day he brought a golden cage and placed it in front of her. She stared at it, panic seizing her into stillness.
“If you go in the cage, I can carry you and we can still fly together without you getting burned,” the dragon said to her with a bit of desperation in his eyes. “Please, I miss flying with you so much. Please, this is the only way we can fly together.” He pushed the gilded cage toward her and opened the door. She looked up at him and shook her head and flew off. Hours later she returned to the empty cage. Her dragon was nowhere in sight. She stood outside the cage and pecked at it with her yellow beak. She didn’t want to be in the cage. Her heart cried at the thought of it. But, she did miss her dragon terribly. She missed them flying together in the night and her beautiful feathers were just starting to grow back in from the many near misses of his flames. She climbed onto the open door frame of the cage and sat there for a moment, sick with panic. Then she stepped into the cage, onto the swinging golden bar that hung inside. She gripped it tightly and felt wave after wave of utter terror. Breathing in a heavy gulp, she turned around and around in the cage until her tail feathers were settled at the bottom. Perhaps it wouldn’t be so bad. The cage was large and she could spread her wings inside it. She took several deep breaths and fluffed herself up and waited.
Soon the dragon returned and smiled brightly when he saw her sitting in the cage. It made him so happy that she was willing to be in the cage just to be with him. He closed up the cage door and locked it so she wouldn’t fall out. With the click of the lock the phoenix’s heart dropped into her belly. Her feathers dulled just slightly as the dragon picked up the cage in his claws and rose into the sky. He flew so happily, twisting and turning with her and she held tightly to her bar. They lived this way for some time. Flying, swooping, rolling and banking, but she never got to feel the air under her wings except for the whipping of the breeze through her feathers. He fed her through the bars, and seemed to be completely blind to the fact that her feathers had almost faded of all their once brilliant splendor. He forgot that she had wings too and that she relished in the joy of flight. All that mattered to him is that they were together as he was flying.
For a brief time, a white raven followed the pair through the sky, watching the phoenix, attempting to understand why the lovely bird was in the cage being carried through the sky. She would fly beside the cage and peck at the bars to get the phoenix’s attention. The phoenix squawked at the little bird, motioning for her to go away. In her resolve, she pecked the raven’s feet as she attempted to pick the lock on the cage door. She loved her dragon and wouldn’t leave his side. She would survive without flying for it made him so happy to have her with him.
After many years, there came a day the dragon looked in the cage and the phoenix was lying in the bottom, barely breathing and all of her feathers had turned a pale ivory color. She rasped in and out as she tried to lift her wings. She pleaded to him with her eyes to let her go, but he didn’t understand what was wrong. In his fear, he shook the cage violently and roared at her to get up. She just lay there and closed her eyes. He threw stones at the cage, and stomped around and blasted fire at the trees and grass on the mountain. Still she lay there; quiet; her breath slowly stopping. She died in the bottom of that cage. The dragon roared and screamed and raged and lit the entire mountain aflame. He kicked the cage over and her limp body flailed about inside.
Suddenly, her body exploded into a violent blue and gold fire, more intense than the flames the dragon lit all about them. It consumed the golden cage bars and they melted into the green grass of the mountainside. The dragon sat back on his haunches and watched, astonished as the phoenix rose into the sky, growing to twice the size she was before. With her wings outspread, she hovered over him and spoke in a voice that seemed to come from the sky, the ground, the water in the rivers and the rock of the mountain.
“You shall hold me no more. I am no longer yours to possess. I am free and will never enter another’s cage to be at their side.” Her voice, strong and beautiful, felt good in her throat and mouth. She spread her wings wide and darted into the air, flying away from the dragon as he sat in a puddle of his own tears. Her heart tore as she flew away, as she loved her dragon dearly and knew that she would never again fly with him.
She didn’t look back; only flew forward and as high into the sky as she could go. She pressed on for days and nights, stopping little and eating less. Without realizing it, she had flown almost across the whole world and was back at the luscious green jungle she’s passed so many years ago. Exhausted, she landed on one of the lofty trees and rested there a while with her beak tucked under her wing. When she woke, night was all around her and the sounds of animals hunting and moving about in the jungle filled her ears. A low grumbling growl rolled upward and she shivered slightly though it wasn’t cold at all up in the trees. It was quite warm; humid even and the weight of it sat on her lungs. Her heart beat loudly in her ears as she gulped in air. An intense pain gripped her heart and she lost her hold on the branch. As she fell, she found she couldn’t expand her wings enough to fly, but they gave her enough lift that when she hit the ground it wasn’t at full force. She landed with a slight thud and lay there, face down, trying to catch her breath. The pain in her heart grew to a smoldering burn that radiated from her chest. She closed her eyes and thought perhaps she might die again.
Warm breath touched the side of her face and still she couldn’t open her eyes. She lay perfectly still as the breath moved about her body; sniffing, searching. Perhaps she was about to be eaten, but she didn’t really care. It would end the pain in her heart. A wet nose gently nudged her about, turned her up onto her side and slowly onto her back. She cringed as the pain in her heart intensified. A muffled squawk slipped out of her beak and tears sprang from her eyes, spilling jewels all about the ground. The pain choked her and she couldn’t move. There was movement above her and she felt very big paws standing on each side of her. She wasn’t sure what kind of animal they belonged to. There was certainly a feline presence, but she couldn’t be sure in her altered state. It didn’t matter anyway. All she really wanted was to die in that moment because the searing pain became too intense to bear. A low grumbling purr emanated from the beast above her, and as the purr turned to a low growl she felt the pain ease as something slowly pulled its way out of her heart. With a quick jerk, the beast put its maw to her chest and pulled something out of her; what, she didn’t know.
The pain was gone! Her eyes opened slowly and the most beautiful white tiger with blue stripes she’d ever seen stood over her with a long sliver of gold wire in its mouth. She recognized it as a piece of her cage. The tiger slowly grinned around the piece of wire, grumbled low in its belly then started to purr. The phoenix wiggled her way out from under the tiger and stood up. Shaking her feathers out, she came to stand facing the tiger; looking into its striking amber eyes. The tiger spit the piece of metal onto the ground, nudged it toward her then lifted its magnificent head and stood very still looking at her. She looked down at it and felt a significant release as the pain completely disintegrated and melted away from her heart. She cried more tears and shed dozens of glittery jewels onto the ground about the tiger’s feet. The tiger batted them about playfully and the phoenix laughed with a caw. They chased each other about in the sunlight that was breaking through the thick foliage of the forest. She flew over the tiger’s head and darted about happily up into the branches. The tiger followed her, clawing up the trees as high as it could climb. It came to rest on a huge branch high above the ground and she landed gracefully next to it, nuzzling its softly furred face with her beak. Grumbling purrs from the tigers slightly open mouth blew warm breath on her face. She basked in the overwhelming feeling of peace that surrounded them high in the trees with the light streaming through the canopied branches. She scooted closer and laid her head over onto the side of the tiger’s face, and closed her eyes, listening to its rumbling purr as it vibrated next to her. She loved the tiger for healing her heart. She knew she would love it always, for once she felt love for a creature it had a special place in her heart forever.
The next morning, the tiger beckoned her down out of the tree and she landed on the ground beside it. They walked together and the tiger nudged her wing feathers gently. Somehow she knew she had to leave her tiger. There were things she needed to do. She nuzzled the tiger’s face with her beak and lifted up into the trees and flew again.
Soon she came to a quiet pond, clear and smooth as glass. There were shiny objects laying all around the pond. They were orange and white and black speckled and they glimmered in the sun. As she grew closer, she realized they were fish. Still fish. That didn’t make sense; still fish. It dawned on her that they were not alive. She panicked as she flew low, touching them with the tips of her talons. None of them moved. In the distance she saw a man walking with a pack on his shoulder. She sped to him and dove around his head as she saw the beautiful koi fish in his hands. She was so angry that she slashed at his face with her feet and beak. He dropped the fish and batted at her. She screamed shrilly at him and he covered his ears, running as fast as his feet could carry him. The phoenix landed next to the poor koi fish. At first, it appeared dead, but she realized that it’s gills were moving ever so slightly. She quickly picked it up gently with her feet and flew back to the pond and slipped the fish into the water. It rested on the surface a moment and then wiggled beneath a blue ripple. The phoenix watched as the koi came back to the top of the pond.
“Thank you,” it bubbled to her. “He killed them all and saved me for last. One by one he picked us up out of the water and held us, cooing beautiful words. Seducing each of us to believe that he loved us. We believed him. I… believed him. He lied and each of us slowly stopped breathing. Then he tossed them all aside, and carried me with him. Until you came along.”
Listening to the koi tell her story, the phoenix cried her tears, dropping jewels about the dead koi fish. With each tear, one of the fish flopped to life and she helped them back into the pond. Once they had all been returned, she sat quietly on the banks of the pond, watching them all swimming happily beneath the surface. Orange, gold, white, black, blue, green, and yellow scales winked in the sun as the phoenix peered into a still piece of the pond. She was shocked to see fingers forming at the end of her wings. She tried to rise up but couldn’t. She panicked as she watched as she slowly transformed into the woman she once was.
“No!!” she cried. “I want to be her, not this human form!”
Her auburn hair waved in the wind. It had grown to her waist and her hazel eyes sparkled as tears flowed down her pale cheeks. Naked, she stood at the ponds edge wondering what to do next. She sat down and fingered the water and the koi fish whose life she’d saved from the man gently kissed her fingertips.
“Thank you dear lady for saving us. We can blanket you in sunlight for your journey home. It isn’t far from where you first came. If you walk toward the sun, you will be home before you know it. Go with our love; go back to where you came and tell your story.”
The woman stood slowly and stepped backward a few steps and turned to leave. The fish sang a gentle chorus that filled her ears as she walked. Soon she couldn’t hear them anymore and she wondered for hours into the night. She realized that though it was dark, she wore a cloak of light which she pulled around her for warmth in the freezing night. She walked and walked and walked. Morning came and a blue butterfly flitted down onto her shoulder.
“Mama, I missed you!” the butterfly cried out. “I’m so happy to see you!” He flitted away toward a herd of horses, chasing down the chestnut colt that she knew even from this distance. He jerked his head around and came at a full gallop toward her. As he and the butterfly approached, they each transformed into handsome boys; the colt with blue eyes and short chestnut hair. The butterfly into a younger, brown-eyed, curly headed boy. They ran to their mother, and she took them in her arms. They had grown so much since she left. Tears streamed down her cheeks as she held them and kissed their heads and held their faces in her hands. She remembered the day they had transformed into their animal alter egos. Life had become so hard for them all. She was grateful for their transformation because she knew they would be able to take care of themselves when she couldn’t.
Time passed and she watched the boys grow into young men, and with each passing day, they came to her and watched as she worked on painting after painting of her journey. The visions of the music man, the dragon, the tiger, the raven and the koi fish came to life on her canvases. Some she sold, some hung in famous galleries and museums; some she gave away and some she kept. She told her boys and their children her story over and over.
The day came that the woman was old and it was time for her to move on to her next life. She lay quietly holding her sons’ hands. As she slipped away, two diamonds dropped from her cheek as her last tears fell. Her youngest son picked them up from the pillow and put one in his pocket, handing the other to his brother. They looked about her room at her paintings where her story lived on even after she passed from this world. In a drawer they found her cloak of light. She’d made it into two coats, one for each of them with a note that lay on top of the neatly folded, bright fabric of the sun.
“My dearest sons, my love walks with you every day even through the darkness. Remember me and my story and know that I love you always, Mama.”
