Image of the Week: Rekindling
© D. Yael Bernhard
Winter holidays are all about rekindling in times of darkness. We have only interior light to illuminate our lives through these long nights – the light of our hearths and homes. Once this was firelight, candlelight, or oil lamps only. Today it's electric light and the flickering of screens.
It's also a time of turning inward, to the light within. This inner light is especially precious, for it spirals outward, illuminating our spirits and the lives of others. How this manifests is as individual and diverse as people themselves. With that idea in mind, I tried to keep this illustration as universal and non-specific as possible (I considered a figure with no hair or facial features, but it looked too much like a fetus). The simple geometry of a double spiral provides an appropriate ambiguity: is the woman holding something in her solitude, like a vessel, or is she bringing it forth? A spiral can go either way. The wavy lines within echo the wavy lines that surround her, just as our inner state ripples through our outer world. Gradients of color in her arms suggest change; selective white outlines suggest illumination. And the muted background colors make the magenta that much brighter by contrast. Somehow, it all came together.
Judging from the response I've gotten to this illustration over the years, people have a deep need for rekindling. Sometimes our inner light goes out and must be relit, breathed upon gently and coaxed back to life. As I write these words, I must stop and rekindle the fire in my wood stove, which nearly went out because I didn't want to interrupt my flow. I try to keep my inner light burning steadily – but it, too, runs out of fuel sometimes. The physical fire is easier to tend than the spiritual one. One serves as a metaphor and model for the other.
Christmas falls near solstice for a reason – for what better rekindling of hope can there be than the birth of a miracle child? The spark of new light within darkness also represents the tension of opposites, from which hope and change arise. Tension and pressure create movement. Difficulty motivates resolve and paves the way for progress. Out of the darkness comes light. While the need to rekindle may feel like failure, the act of rekindling is strengthening – like our immune system, which is strengthened by illness. This is not failure – this is life.
So gather your kindling and stir the ashes to find the hot coals beneath. Among the Iroquois people who once populated the land where I live, a ritual stirring of the coals was their way of bringing in the new year (I illustrated that once, too). Once you do that, a few twigs – or maybe some packing material from a UPS box – will be enough to rekindle your fire.
Wishing you warmth and illumination through the dark winter months – and the strength to rekindle your inner light, when necessary.
Come spring, I'll be spreading the ashes from my wood stove on my garden as fertilizer.
Happy holidays to all!