A/N: I recently read a fanfic by The Random Hummingbird about Ilmarë, the handmaiden of Varda, and it was very good. Now, I'm trying to do generally the same thing with Vána the Ever-Young. Please forgive me if I don't write as much about flowers as I do about birds; I've loved birds since I was very young, and I'm familiar with many, but though flowers are beautiful to me, too, I'm not an expert on them.
By the way, this fanfic very briefly mentions nakedness once or twice, but no adult themes, I just thought I'd let you be forewarned.
Disclaimer: I do not own the Silmarillion or any other books written by Tolkien.
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In the flower gardens spread around Valinor, she walks through them every day, and they always open at her coming, rejoicing at her own joy and purity. The rose, the dandelion, the lilies, and most of all, the golden daffodils, all blossom with life as she, the avatar of Spring, breathes life back to places where winter once reigned. This is Vána, spreading joy wherever she goes.
The gardens also attract many birds from the skies, songbirds like cardinals, bluebirds, goldfinches, thrushes, hummingbirds, warblers, and nightingales, who also feel great joy at seeing her coming, and sing their lovely, wordless songs to her and to the air. They know that when she approaches, the land will turn bright white and there will be nothing to fear.
Vána rejoices as she walks toward them, too, for flower blossom and bird song are her chief delights, and the gold daffodils and many-colored birds give a feeling of living beauty unlike any other. The bluebird brings her happiness, the cardinal brings sweetness, the goldfinch fun and excitement, the hummingbird humility, the nightingale pure majesty, the thrush company, and the warbler more sweetness. The daffodils and other flowers, in turn, give her reassurance that things growing in the ground will remain forever lovely.
She is not called the Ever-Young for nothing, for she is ageless. Eru Ilúvatar (God) created her to be the perfect incarnation of the females of both of His children, elves and men. The most perfectly beautiful in form and feature, and also holy but not august or sublime, she represents the natural unmarred perfection of form in living things. She looks as a woman in heavenly communion with Eru Himself might look. Tall and straight-backed, shoulder-length golden hair, shining blue eyes, sweet smelling, dressed only in a shimmering white dress that is more an afterthought to her beauty than an article of man-made or elf-made clothing, that did not disguise the radiant smoothness of her flesh, she was naked to all longing eyes, though not to lustful eyes, and yet not naked to the righteousness of Eru and the Ainur. For her raiment is her woman's body; her normal form is as an angelic spirit without physical form. Being unfallen creatures, Vána and her bretheren do not need to cover up their nakedness.
Male and female elves, and men and women alike worship her, not as they would worship Ilúvatar, but as those who desire everlasting joy, happiness, and eternal youth through devotion to an angelic god, for in her duties as the keeper of the songbirds and flower gardens of Valinor, she is the giver of joy and the destroyer of misery, the happiest of the Valar, if you will, so no one can feel any truly negative feelings with her as their guide in life. And courtesy of Irmo, even men and women faithful to Eru, who are not permitted to live in Aman, can see her in their dreams and visions.
So next time you see a radiant, lovely, blond woman clothed only in the righteousness of Eru Ilúvatar, think of Vána the Ever-Young, bringing fresh, new life wherever she goes.
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A/N: I got the idea of a heavenly body (naked and yet not naked, and radiant smoothness of flesh) from chapter three of C.S. Lewis' book The Great Divorce. I wanted to make an original yet as accurate as possible portrayal of her; I saw a picture of her in an "afterthought" white dress as the artist put it on deviantART once. That's where I got some of the details in this fanfic from. I credit that material to GreenInkling, an artist on deviantART.
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