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(SA/2026)
The presence of a solitary magpie amidst a cluster of daffodils reminds one of the often stark contrast between symbols, systems of classification, and the more chaotic reality of nature.
On one hand, we have the daffodil: a genus formally identified by Linnaeus in 1753 and subsequently burdened with the weight of Romantic poetry.
Whilst Wordsworth and Keats ideally framed the flower as a source of eternal joy, its appeal for me lies more in its lack of cultivated pretension and the fact that the humble daffodil is biologically resilient, nodding in defiant affirmation regardless of its proximity to litter and traffic [1].
The magpie, meanwhile, is a bird forever trapped in the ornithomantic binaries of folklore. However, to view a lone magpie through the lens of the traditional nursery rhyme is to participate in the superstitious belief that grief and happiness are somehow separate states.
As any Nietzschean will remind you, such oppositions are untenable. Joy and sorrow are forever tied and to demand the mirth of the second bird while rejecting the misery of the first is a failure to recognise that life, much like a magpie's plumage, is defined by its iridescent complexity and contradictions and is never simply black and white [2].
Notes
[1] See the post 'Continuous as the Stars That Shine ...' (16 Mar 2023): click here.
'One for sorrow,
ReplyDeleteTwo for joy,
Three for a girl,
Four for a boy,
Five for silver,
Six for gold,
Seven for a secret never to be told.'
Which is, if you think about it (all) (as I try to do as a Crowleyan numerologist) more like a form of folk numerology than a simple binary code.
Aren't all the best people - let alone the best flowers - 'humble' and 'biologically resilient'?
The Nietzschean point about curdled psychic states is all very well but risks making an anthropomorphic projection onto the magpie. Since it is usually seen as part of a mating pair (especially in breeding season), this possibly sheds clearer light on why 'one for sorrow' more plausibly signifies an ornithologically attuned empathy than a philosopher in need of deconstruction.