Wings

Canova's "Psyche Revived by Cupid's Kiss"

 A week or so ago after spending a whole afternoon/evening in the sun, I sunburned myself - which, despite the bad health issues attached to it and the redness, is one of my favorite feelings. A day after, I put on a tank top different from the one I'd worn that day and my boyfriend says, "Love, it looks like you have wings!" The tank top I'd been wearing during the sunburn-ing had a wavy strap down the middle of my back that had left that skin white compared to the now tan shoulders and arms; when I spread my arms out on either side ("gracefully" like the ballerina I've always wanted to be), it looked like I had wings to him.

Wings. A human fascination born of us lacking them, and watching all those that possess them soar. There's something ethereally beautiful about it. I want to talk about anamnesis, but I'm saving that for my paper. However, this above photo caught my eye in class.

Next to Bernini, Canova was one of my favorite sculptors that I encountered on my study abroad travels. I saw this statue in person at the Louvre - Pascaline, my Art History professor said that it had been the inspiration for the images of some of Walt Disney's princess characters. It's tender, and it's beautiful - being the romantic that I am, I fell in love with this image. So much love. And look at his wings!

"Cupid and Psyche Contemplating a Butterfly"

Next to that statue, is another one of his works - and this one touched me more than the first. It's called, "Cupid and Psyche Contemplating a Butterfly" but on seeing it, I remembered what Pascaline said earlier about the Greeks seeing the butterfly as a symbol of the soul - something we mentioned in class on Monday. And seeing that statue, watching Psyche gently place this little butterfly in Cupid's hand I thought, She loves him and knows him so well, she is trusting him with her soul. 

To me, without trust, there is no love. Among the Greek/Roman gods, there isn't much trust or fidelity (As we all know), but I was looking at that statue forgetting that, and imagining a different couple, a young couple. And that simple gesture, that little symbol, spoke mountains to me.

In most love stories, it's the heart that is given - so isn't it funny that we say "soul-mates" instead of "heart-mates"? And yet my two favorite book quotes say nothing of the heart, and everything of the soul. Wuthering Heights, "Whatever our souls are made of, his and mine are the same" and Their Eyes Were Watching God, "Janie looked upon him with a self-crushing love. And so her soul crawled out from it's hiding place."

There are the matters of the heart, and then of the soul.

How incredibly beautiful is the idea of butterflies symbolizing something so deep and powerful, on such light and colorful wings. Us, and our winged souls.