Creating content

Symbols: pikorua and koru

Day 29 of 100-day Creator Challenge

Today’s prompt for the 100-day is about what symbols resonate for you. Jibran said that for him it is the koru (unfurling fern). In Māori it symbolises life, growth, development, ever unfolding.

I’ve personally always liked a twist or a braid pattern as a variation of a twist. I chose a braid pattern when I was weaving the ties for the my partner’s shroud.

It has three strands intertwining with each other. I like to think that it was the three of us: him, me and our daughter whose lives will always be linked even after his passing.

Jibran’s prompt asks what the symbol would look like if you designed it yourself. Twenty years ago I learned the art of bone carving. I designed and made this for my partner:

It has a pikorua (twist) at the top that is the bond. It also has two koru, one smaller on top of the other. For me it was our lives unfurling together. To top it off it looks a bit like a treble clef, and he was a musician.

Now that he has passed away, I see the two koru as me and my daughter. And she’s the musician.

Symbols can go both ways: it can have meanings in of itself. But also it can be something that you assign meanings too, ever evolving.