Due to the special nature of these jewels, they are only available for purchase one per person. 

IMPORTANT: This listing is for a One of a Kind jewel that cannot be replaced. We recommend Express Shipping with signature required upon delivery to make sure it arrives safely into your hands. 

This necklace is Ready To Ship and will leave the studio in 3 - 5 business days. 

Please note : This necklace will be created with an 18" bar link chain. If you desire a different chain length you must reach out to us immediately after placing your order.

Twin Planchette Moths representing lovers, friends, the conscious and the unconscious mind as well as the spirit realm / the natural realm forever "kiss". Below a large Mother of Pearl tear cabochon dangles, invoking the iridescent chamber of shells and the endless "tears" of the sea of grief.

These days, I have come to think of my grief as being made of water. Often times I imagine it living in the cauldron of my heart, or in that seemingly void space between my heart and stomach, maybe you can imagine it - a space that feels as if a black hole exists there, a night sea, a sea of grief where one grief lives and then another is poured into it, and then another, another ...until the grief becomes a kind of elixir I'm cooking over a fire, an elixir that cures no one, least of all me.

Other days I feel my grief is so large and so shadowy that its made of my body a haunted house; speculative fiction writer Samantha Hunt writers in her NYT interview :

" I started to think about the way we get haunted as a process of calcification, 'haunted' is when something accompanies you, when we are not fully aware of a presence. It's something that you carry around inside of you." 

I think on this at night, when mostly everything is quiet, and my thought patterns shift from my day time rhythm to more 'cocoon' thoughts which I equate to the process of 'calcification' that Hunt describes. My cocoon space becomes liquid with my grief, it becomes filled with my griefs which feel like ghosts, like presences I carry around with me.

These griefs are both big and small. The large griefs are the loss of people, the deaths I dance with, that I try to understand and still, despite it being years later, accept. This dance sometimes becomes a grappling in the dark, I can feel myself shouldering against walls of understanding and violently losing. Maybe you understand how this kind of grief can surface like a mammoth tusk in an ice thaw. Unexpected and sharp, before it recedes again, sinks back into a place where it was long buried. 

Then there are the small griefs we carry. We mourn the loss of our identity ( so many of us perhaps unexpectedly faced this these past two years with unplanned moves, job changes etc ), the feeling of not being enough, or of being 'too much'. We mourn the loss of lovers, and the loss of friends who we once thought of as family. The family who we thought we were aligned with in all matters of the heart. The grief of illness, the grief of a missed opportunity. The grief of being displaced, the grief of feeling helpless in the face of so much timeline horror ..... this griefs are also poured into the sea of my heart, the sea of the collective heart. The sea in my cocoon, where the liquid that pools around me, helps me transform, much like the moth .....

Herein lies the inspiration for our newest iteration of the Planchette Grief Moth, an object, a jewel, a talisman to help carry your griefs, both little and large. Designed to be highly tactile, this moth is a dream moth. It features a subtle planchette shape, as well as another enduring symbol of our line, the silver tear, on either side of its head. Its two 'comet' like tails represent the brief, bright lives that moths live, drawn to the celestial lights of the night sky, as well as being akin to the long shapes tears can take when not immediately wiped away on the face.

Designed to also exist as a  'being', or a presence on your hand or body, rub it like a 'worry stone' during times of intense emotion, when feeling disembodied or stressed, if you can't shed your own tears or are trying your best not to. 

MOTH:

The mystery of transformation and all its nuances are wrapped up in the symbology of the moth: during its time in its cocoon, its body completely liquefies, wholly transforming itself into a new, different body, all the while retaining its memories. It is an ancient creature, millions of years older than the butterfly and usually nocturnal; using the glow of the moon and stars as its guiding light. As (mostly) nocturnal beings, Moths are often associated with the mystery, magic, and dream like quality of the Night. This nocturnality associates Moth (as well as Spider, Snake, Scorpion) with the Shadow Self. The Shadow Self is a concept via Carl Jung and represents the repressed parts of our psyche, the traits that are societally/culturally deemed ‘bad’ or ‘unacceptable’ (anger, sadness, grief, selfishness, pettiness, etc.) The shadow is composed of all of the disowned and unwanted parts of yourself that you press down into the unconscious. Shadow work – the process of identifying (rather than projecting onto others) these traits and feelings is messy, brutal, lifelong work. There are romantic aspects to it (for me, the dream of being whole), but it also has a raw quality, akin to those traumatic first days of new grief. Jung emphasizes the importance of integrating the shadow more consciously into ourselves – a way of recognizing, accepting and transforming these ‘horrors’ hidden within ourselves. As a balm / protective talisman, our Grief Moth helps carry these ‘shadow feelings’ for its wearer

Moths are ancient; fossils of them have been dated to be around 190-201 million years old, making them older than butterflies. Their bodies undergo intense transformation: first, the caterpillar weaves itself a silky cocoon to change within. This radical transformation includes a near total disintegration of their previous bodies into a kind of jelly, while still retaining memory. The body begins to reshape itself into what it will become while within this dark and creatively fertile place, and once it is ready, it emerges, a creature with wings and the ability to fly.

This communion with the self in the dark velvet of the cocoon, and with transformation, often links the moth to those seeking or undergoing major psychic shifts in their lives or within their bodies/psyches. Moths are nocturnal and are said to be ‘led by moonlight.’ This natural proclivity also links them to the underworld, the realms of the unconscious; in some cultures, they are believed to be the signs of the spirits of the recent dead.

This design is also inspired by my continuing struggles with grief and my interests in the many tales of the afterlife, as well as the question many of my planchette and Spiritualist inspired jewels asks: Are we capable of continuing a relationship with our dead? For most, periods of grief are often lonely and isolated times. During the intensity of the start of my dance with grief, the planchette became a personal symbol to me and for the love that endures after death. The Planchette (as a separate object from the Spirit Board) has long been used as a tool for automatic writing, for connecting to the unconscious. Later, it would become associated with spirit communication and Séance. Here, the moth has become a symbolic winged messenger, ferrying messages from different planes of existence, between the inner and outer selves, between the living and the dead.

*Details* :

- 73 mm from top to bottom of tears 

- Solid sterling silver

- Paired with our signature sterling silver bar link chain, oxidized to our gloomy grey finish

- Set with one 20 x 30 mm Pear Cut Mother of Pearl stone

Pearls

Have an ancient history of reverence as well as a long legacy of beauty. Pearls are formed when an external irritant, like a grain of sand, breaches the shell of an oyster or shelled mollusk. Once this irritant has gained entrance within the dark fleshy confines of the oyster, it goes to work protecting itself. If this irritant can’t be expelled, it begins to ‘bandage’ the grain, coating it with concentric rings of calcium carbonate, named ‘narce.’ Each layer that is built up forms the shape of the pearl, awash in a brilliant iridescence, a beauty born of a tiny trespass. Thusly, a pearl has at its center, the object of its creation, a foreign intruder.

I associate the pearl and its strange construction to so many things: the jellied caterpillar struggling within a chrysalis, its liquefied body form a new winged shape. An embedded star smoldering within the shell of our hearts. An ink dot, a pin prick, a moon in miniature. History, who has always loved and revered the pearl, writes that we once believed pearls were the result of lightning striking the shell and penetrating the inner skins of the oyster. A small beauty made in duress, a ‘stone’ of initiation. To possess a pearl means to own something that is hidden, sacred.

Lore has it that Cleopatra, to win a wager with Antony, dissolved a large, exquisite pearl in her drinking glass. She swallowed it in one sip. I wonder about her dreams that night.

This jewel is hand cut and therefore may have small signs of the carver's hands along the edges. This has not been fabricated by a machine, it has been made by hand and therefore isn't uniformly perfect. The photographs accurately portray the quality of the stone. The photographs accurately portray the quality of the stones and the cuts. 

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If you have further questions, we are always here to serve you in a kind and timely manner: via bloodmilkjewels@gmail.com