Antique Skies and Seas

Summer solstice always makes me think on a grand scale—back down through the millenia to the perfect alignment of Stonehenge, and that doorway at Knossos where the sun on rising comes between the stones to light—well, what?  Some ancient mystery, lost in time.  The thrill of the immense.

At Chichen Itza, on this day, the Mayan Temple of Kukulcan appears to split in two.  At Machu Picchu, in the Nazca Lines, between the Pyramids of Giza . . . the marking of the firmament in ordered rounds.

Harnessing the sun’s magic for our own.  Or losing ourselves in periodic wonder of it, anyway.  Living in awe.  Letting the unknown get as close as we can bear.

I’ve always loved those things.  One of the books I’ve gone back to again and again is Astronomy of the Ancients.  (I am distressed not to be able to find it on my shelves just now.) 

And yet—for me, this morning, the beginning of summer is nothing more or less than just a little lavender white tea in my Italian cup.  A red ball thrown up by a child into the curving of a sandstone arch.

This amiable art, suggesting all the mysteries available for the asking if I choose to venture out.

Light-gathering.

image:  Valeri Tsenov, Antique Seas