When his wings enfold you yield to him, though the sword hidden among his feathers may wound you.

I'm learning about wings this week.

He will cover you with His pinions,
And under His wings you may seek refuge;
His faithfulness is a shield and bulwark.

Pinions are the long, stiff flight feathers at the furthest tip of a bird's wing. They are individually controlled by the bird to adjust to changes in the wind and air currents. The feathers on a bird's wing get smaller as they recede along the wing toward the body. Each feather has small barbs that lock the feathers around it into place, forming a solid, air-resistant wall of wing.

The bone structure at the end of a bird's wing is referred to as his "hand" - it's made up of various parts, specifically phalanges. In the Greek, phalanx was a tight formation, used in military and anatomical definitions. Anatomically, it describes the knuckle bones along the ridge of your hand - "originally the whole row of finger joints, which fit together like infantry in close order" (Online Etymology Dictionary). They form a barrier, a unified front that cannot be penetrated.

Think along those lines. Mother birds shepherd their chicks and sweep them under their wings at any sign of danger. If an enormous wing were to sweep down and cover you, the feathers would be stiff and tumble you, possibly bruising you in the movement. But you would be pressed into the soft down feathers along the bird's side. From the outside, nothing could get through to you.

Now look at this: the word "bulwark" derives from bole, meaning "plank, tree trunk" (OED). The word "phalanx," before it was used in the Greek, derives from the Proto-Indo-European word meaning "round piece of wood, trunk, log" (OED).

I'm still working on the significance of all this. But it's reassuring to know that I am in a place that is warm, safe, and impenetrable. I am protected, kept in line, mothered tenderly. And yet the protection set up around me that is so stiff and fierce is also a force that nurtures and soothes. Again...paradox.