American Voudou: Journey Into a Hidden World (47 page)

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Authors: Rod Davis

Tags: #Body; Mind & Spirit, #General, #Religion, #Ethnic & Tribal, #Social Science, #Ethnic Studies, #African American Studies, #test

BOOK: American Voudou: Journey Into a Hidden World
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Page 308
Ava and others dancing during bimbé at conclusion of Ava's initiation in
Atlanta.

 

Page 309
Baba Kunle, left, and Baba Tunde, during bimbé.
Baba Tunde, seated. Ava at right, in white, during final initiation ceremony.

 

Page 310
Bare-breasted, she was adorned in the traditional affectations of Oya: a floor-length skirt trimmed with long strands of grass, a feather-covered leather crown from which hung strips of cowries, covering her face like a medieval war helmet. Her arms were coated with white longitudinal markings, almost serpentine, and white dots, the dots of ashé, covered her hands and bare feet. A palm fan lay to one side, as did Oya's black horsetail whisk and machete.
The drummers were good, and before long just about everyone was dancing, getting in the mood. I perched on a chair at the back of the room for a better view, and more airit was a sweat bath. Eventually Baba Kunle, in a sparkling white Obatala robe highlighted with aqua embroidery, moved toward the throne. Formally launching the "presentation," he helped his goddaughter to her feet and invited her to dance for her visitors. She rose in a swirl of lithe grace and floated through the room, smiling at each face as it came into her gaze. When she passed mine, I could see she was pretty close to giving herself over to possession.
A half-hour later the Oba escorted Ava back to her seat and gestured to the musicians to stop playing. As senior priest he was to give a short speech of welcome. He greeted the guests in Yoruba, according to protocol, then repeated himself in English, and that might have been the end of it. But, like everyone else in the room, the king's heart was full. Something more needed saying. He looked out at us, cleared his throat. Feet shuffled, clothing rustled, a few people fanned themselves with their hands, but where there had been dancing and drumming now was an electric stillness.
"All across American now in every major city you are going to find that the gods of Africa have descended," he began. "They are sitting on their thrones and the people are coming to greet them and welcome them." He looked at Ava. ''Gradually, we shall overcomethrough these initiations, which so many of the people, of the voudou inside of the people, are seeking."

 

Page 311
"Amen," came some voices. Then, many.
"Ashé! Ashé!"
"People of Atlanta," he proclaimed, throwing open his arms, "present yourselves to Oya!"
One by one, priests and guests complied. When my turn came, I did as the others, approaching Ava's throne, falling forward into a prone position. Then I eased my body full to the floor, face-down, and leaned onto my right elbow. I rose, sort of proud of myself. Baba Kunle was grinning so broadly I thought he would laugh. He greeted me African style, touching shoulders alternately.
When we had finished, a little after 10
P.M
., Kunle escorted Ava away, and the drums started again. She soon came back, but now, as an iyawo, changed into a plain white gown, with a white coverlet draping her face, head, and shoulders. Simple, clean, pure.
Though she could not see because of the coverlet, everyone danced again in front of her. One of the priests picked up an aluminum cooking pot filled with water. He took it outside, emptied it and then brought it back, turning it upside downa sign that the old vessel had been drained, that the life of the iyawo was now empty and ready to be filled with change.
It was pretty much over. The Oba interrupted the drumming a last time to officially close the ceremony with a long prayer in Yoruba, and guests began trickling outside. A few weren't ready to let go, though, and badgered Simmons into a brief encore. But he was spent, and in almost no time slipped out into the night. A woman who wanted to "really start the party" went to the basement for some record albums. Someone else was foraging for rum.
I went downstairs and stood in the door between the kitchen and the reception area, the spot that had been an indoor lake during the flooding last June, and I knew the spirits had taken me as far as they could. As far as I could let them.

 

Page 312
It was that abrupt. It was time to go.
I wouldn't be able to see Ava again that night but I knew she'd understand. I walked outside. It felt good to breathe the freshness of the night. A few children, relatives of Ava who'd come all the way from Louisiana, were picking away at slivers of cake and frosting, looking around wide-eyed but not saying much.
I said my goodbyes and headed for the gate. The first time I'd passed through, I had no idea what lay within. Now I wondered what waited outside, in the "real" world, a world which, in many ways, was never going to be the same for me. I nodded to a thin, elderly man I'd seen but not talked to all night. He was dressed in white sport shirt and slacks, and carried a Bible.

 

Page 313
22
Amen
I like ritual because it is a form of arta contrivance of human thought in the attempt to reach the eternal and unknowable. Ritual lets us believe in things we can see and do, because the gods are too remote. Christians reach God through symbols: the cross, the saints, and especially the human form of God, which they call Jesus. The voudou worshiper has the orisha, the ancestors, and altars and a thousand kinds of talismans, herbs and objects of magic, all of which exist to make contact with eternity.
I like ritual, but I do not believe in it. Ritual is bureaucracy; ritual is control; ritual is exclusion. Even as it attempts to make knowable the unknowable, ritual confines, in the same way that criticism and categorization confine art. An artist who studies criticism, form and categories must break and defy them in order to create something new. Otherwise art is photocopying. What is a religion that does not create something new? What is a religion that is not alive through the people, instead of just in the rules? It is what Nietzche said it wasdead.
But voudou is not dead. The longer I journeyed through its soul, the more I saw that it was a constant act of creation. For

 

Page 314
every rule and ritual I observed, there are dozens of variationsvoudou is not the same in any two countries or cultures, and in that sense the idea of a new Atlantic culture that mingles what started in Africa and what altered itself here is true. In America, voudou is not even the same in any two cities. In the end, I could not say where voudou started or stopped, because, like Dambada Wedo, it doesn't.
In its vitality and regenerationeven in its passionate factional disputesis the proof of its oft-challenged validity. People need voudou. They have done so under the most desperate conditions and despite the most prolonged persecution. They need it because it provides the same comforts, metaphors and insights as do all religions; it links the quick, the dead, the consciousness of both. And though I could not follow it further, it gave something to me as well. I was not a true believer, but I had seen the truth of belief. If I lack the certainty to say there are gods, I learned there is faith. Faith, transferred, is art. Art is creation. The preacher, the priest, the artist, the healer, the grave-digger, the two-headed manwe are all the same. Above all, I saw voudou in that way.
That fall, Lorita Mitchell called to tell me she had changed denominations within the Spiritual church, from the Metropolitan to the Israelite. She was to be re-ordained as a minister during the organization's upcoming annual conventionthat weekend. And it wouldn't just be her, she saidher sons Gary and Andrew would also be ordained. I scrambled to get there, and by Saturday morning stood in front of the Israelite Universal Divine Spiritual Church of Christ at 3000 Frenchman, a stolid brick building on the corner of a working-class black neighborhood northeast of the Quarter. The business part of the weeklong convention was almost finished, and today was devoted to nonstop preaching, with different ministers following each other like acts in a gospel tent. Lorita was scheduled for noon, but things were running late.

 

Page 315
Only a handful of people were on the porch, but as soon as I walked inside I could see where the others had gone. The aging patriarch of the denomination, Archbishop E. J. Johnson, was at the pulpit, passionately defending the efficacy of a cornerstone of Spiritual belief: prophecy. I found a seat amid the crowded pews. Prophecy was another name for Ifa.
"Five years ain't too long for a prophecy to come true," Johnson called out, his voice strong and full.
"Amen," answered the congregation.
"Ten years ain't too long."
"Amen."
"Twenty years ain't too long," he thundered. "I had people come up to me and say, 'What you prophesied
forty years
ago come to pass, and I don't know what they mean 'cause I already forgot."
"Amen."
I glanced around the huge sanctuary. Above on the balcony, a ceramic bust of Blackhawk; elsewhere, portraits of the saints, the black Virgin, a gallery of ornately framed portraits of elders. In the center of it all, a traditional likeness of Jesus.
I nodded to a few of Lorita's parishioners. Willie Mae and Alma, at whose sacrificial ceremony I had met Ricky Cortez, sat to one side. Nearby were Betty, the school teacher, and James, the security guard, to be ordained that evening as a missionary and deacon, respectively. Many of the faithful were from throughout the denomination's domain, the Midwest and South; their vestments designated rank like uniforms at a military ball. Mothers of the churchsenior women but not ministersin purple or white robes; other female membersusually referred to as "sisters"in simple Sunday black or white dresses, shoulders draped with white shawls, heads covered with white lace caps or veils. The Bishops stood out in heavy velvet red robes. The Ministers, male or female, wore black, scarlet or indigo robes, depending on their level. Children were in clean white shirts

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