What becomes of the child born between sea and shore—who must choose whether to hold on, or to let his mother return to the sea where she belongs? Reimagining the tale of the Selkie from the perspective of the Selkie’s son, a liminal figure who carries love and loss in equal measure we come to see the deeper currents that give the story its enduring power. As his mother reclaims her stolen self, he is left to navigate the ache of her absence. Woven with archetypal insight and rich folklore, the story moves like the tides under the pull of many moons—revealing different phases of the whole depending on the vantage point of each character in the story. We descend into the sacred depths of loss, witnessing the grace of a soul who restores what is stolen, frees what is held captive, and weaves back into wholeness a shattered world.

Fox Woman, also known as Kitsune in Japanese folklore, is a shapeshifting trickster character who resembles the elusive, clever fox from the wild. Although this folktale comes in many different variations and her story is told in many tongues, what they all have in common is a trickster character who shifts between human and fox, sometimes androgynous, living in multiple worlds, questioning the order of things through her mischief, playfulness, wit, deception, magic and defiance of authority. The tale of Fox Woman is almost always makes visible the tension between the need for order, and its reinvention.

There is a heartwarming folktale indigenous to Vietnam involving an unexpected romantic coupling between a dragon and a crane that is one of many endearing folktales that make up Vietnam’s rich heritage of maritime folklore. Since the beginning of time storied landscapes have included in-between, magical places like coastlines or intertidal areas between land and sea, and these are often sites of transformation, thresholds between worlds, and are infused with magic. The enduring wisdom of this story is about finding the hidden treasure that is birthed from unexpected connections, and when we choose to come together despite our differences.

A reflection on the folk wisdom offered in The Magical Adventures of Pretty Pearl by Virginia Hamilton filled with beloved characters from African American folklore. How folklore and folk tradition bring a small community fugitives into deep relationship with the wild, and how enchantment and magic serve as a source of psychological resilience and practical survival in the face of unimaginable hardship.