the music of the spheres

for the horse asks: appaloosa?

Appaloosa - What's your favorite horse color(s)?

I don’t really have one but I LOVE when horses and ponies are what they’re supposed to be!

I’m also a huge fan of the primitive markings, and general Lascaux cave horse appearance.

So like I wouldn’t say flaxen chestnut is my favorite AT ALL, but the Haflinger!! . yes you are a cobby little horse with a big butt that needs to be a flaxen chestnut!! and everyone understands this. Perfect animal. No need to track changes. Also I do love when a horse has a bit of texture in their mane and tail, so respect to Haflingers for being the rare wavy-haired horsie. I don’t even like blondes so you see what I mean here about it just being the pure synergy of intention and form and style, the Haflinger just is perfectly complete.

And then a brunblakk fjord horse. The mealy muzzle. The dorsal stripe. Black ear tips. Someone from 20,000 years ago is grasping my hand across space and time and we are crying together about how perfect a thick little horsie can get. Granted the fjords always have the weirdest haircuts in the world, but you can see exactly why. This horse is so perfectly what it’s supposed to be that you can’t resist scrungling it a little bit. Also another animal that IS its name like: all Norwegian Fjords LOOK like the breed name is Norwegian Fjord, and they ARE all named things like Freya. As they should be. This is an animal that is exactly what it should be.

You know how horse people compliment each other’s horses by saying they have a kind eye? It’s hard not to have a Kind Eye if you are a brunblakk Norwegian Fjord.

And of course, my baby, my darling, my moorland mousie, the feral shaggy brown/bay with mealy markings that is the Exmoor Pony. You look at this tubby beastie and you say YES. YES YOU ARE BORN TO BE A LITTLE BEASTIE ENCOUNTERED SUDDENLY ON A MISTY MOOR . The sculpting of the contour colours! Some sculpture artist would spend hours with an airbrush trying to do that! and they just wake up in the morning , eyeliner: on, eyeshadow: on, lipstick: on, cheeks: contoured, muzzle: mealy, dapples subtle, ready to go. Can’t even see their eyes half the time, but underneath 25 pounds of luscious pelted mane they’re wearing natural mascara. And for what? Living full time on rocks in the rain, baby!! This is a cave painting horse and it always will be!

The reverse of that of course is horses who Shouldn’t Be That Color. For example I am a little bit upset by this chestnut Shire, who isn’t a flaxen chestnut and probably should be. What are you doing baby? You need some leg markings sweetheart. Can we just dye your mane and tail black maybe, you have bay energy. Ughhhhh I’m trying not to be prescriptive. Ughhhh all horses are beautiful and beauty standards are fake but ———— - sweet child we HAVE to style you somehow!!!! You are a Shire!!!!! WHAT IS THIS??

And I love - LOVE! - a grulla/grullo. Obvious reasons: I like primitive markings, and I have the aesthetic taste of a small child. Who doesn’t secretly love a deviantart sparklehorse?

but I will be the first to admit that it is a razor’s edge between a really lovely grulla horse who reaches back to touch our shared history and knowledge of ourselves, an unbroken thread of beauty that should be painted in a cave under an ancient mountain, like a jewel of the earth: and a necromantic vessel that was bred to encourage possession by evil ghosts, to be harvested regularly and sold at retail prices by some midwestern white woman as part of some tortuous work-from-home scheme. And I do understand this. I know this about myself and about grullas. Like, this one is a horse that probably shouldn’t - we probably shouldn’t have done this. You know?

Do not ask about cremellos.