I Witness: A Legend Re-Enacted

견우 직녀 (The Cowherd and the Weaver Maid)

I was just strolling around one afternoon, taking random shots around the neighborhood, when I spotted yet another instance of spontaneous visual order -- a condensation trail seemingly picking up where a cable ended -- and took several shots. But when I downloaded the photos I found one among them that was strangely reminiscent of an old legend.

On the night of the seventh day of the seventh lunar month, supposedly two stars, Altair and Vega, approach each other most closely out of the whole year.

As the story goes, Altair is a Cowherd and Vega is a Weaver Maid. He was a mortal and she was a celestial fairy, but they were in love and lived as husband and wife on earth.

This was against the rules, however, and eventually she was found out and forced to return to Heaven. When the husband followed her up to the sky through magic, the Empress of Heaven placed the Milky Way between them to keep them apart.

Even so, their devotion to each other moved her stern heart, and the Empress allowed the lovers to meet one day out of the year. On that day, all the magpies of the world fly up to the sky and form a bridge over the Milky Way with their bodies, so the lovers could step across.

And this is why magpies have such smooth, shiny pates, so they say. This legend is probably Chinese in origin, but it is well-known throughout East Asia (with numerous local variations, I'm sure).

Check out the bridge of magpies in the illustration I found on the internet (I wish I could give credit, but I have no idea who painted it). And look at the photo (expand the image) -- those birds sure do look like they're trying to form a bridge between the cable and the contrail... As above, so below?