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JOURNEYS OF THE SERPENT AND THE MOON
Vodun Woman,
Vodun Woman. Tell us about the Journeys of the Serpent and the Moon.
And the Vodun Woman, she
said:
"Issue of the dark, of the serpentine womb of creation, The deep and high
- that vertical spiraling root.
Linear ascent is a well told lie.
You are molded and here to mold.
Your center allies to the rhythm of the biosphere.
It's that mythical, omnipotent Light
which tricks you into seeing a crescent, a half moon - a point where
you are disconnected from wholeness.
No trust fund, skyscraper or scud missile can hold back the migration
of the dark celestial waters infinitely. Inexorably it claims its own.
Rises and falls.
The physical, social, structural are destined to
disintegrate, by levels, degrees, intervals. Artificial creeds, like
artificial lights, are meaningless in truth. The seeds of decay are
within you and within your creeds."
****
Her grains of salt have awakened me and i can't dissemble in waking
consciousness. i bring weightlessness to misery without physical movement,
shifting heavy mists. it's how i move into another reality when paralyzed
by the shock of this one. i can't live in a dreamtime space where we
never reach the mountaintop. So i live the talk, like i did with USAID:
i acted like they had gone way beyond their myopic visions and meant
what they were saying about helping Haiti. That got me a few places.
Next time i'll go further. Next time, while in this unreachable inner
place, this primordial space, this container of life created and held
for me by the Ancestors, next time when i meet the "developers" in Haiti,
i will issue forth from this space and enter their gaps, pushing at
cracks. Next time, my vision will do more.
This faith saves me. it destroys me. With it, i'm wholly strong and
wholly vulnerable. But now, well now, i can live with that without getting
an aneurysm.
They have their Colonies. This is mine.
i think that was the lesson of Haitian history. i'm irked but jumping
up and down like a kangaroo who's misplaced her pouch won't do.
The message was and still is: burn the port cities and retreat inland.
That's the lesson of Haitian history. The inland portals are protected
and though we must struggle, only the ports can be lost. Pwen voye.
Dignity is always rescued by the primal singular struggle to receive
what's already there but invisible to thought. It's difficult but all
can be done if our thinking aligns with this fact: We are just where
we are supposed to be - an opened door, perfectly placed.
**********
(c) 1997 and 2000 by Marguerite
Laurent/Ezili
Dantò. Excerpted from The Red,
Black & Moonlight monologue series, based on Kenbe La!
Crossings of a Vodun-Roots Woman by Marguerite Laurent. All rights reserved.
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