Under A Hunters Moon
I Ran With The Old Ones
After A While I Heard The Rush Of Great Wings
I Mounted The Eagle
We Ascended Far Above The Mountain Clouds
There Was Freedom There
And Finally
Peace
The Gift Of The Bokor
He walked down the street, drawn as he always was by the music that flowed out of the nightclubs in the French Quarter. He stopped at "Homeboys" bowing his head in unconscious reverence at the haunting sound flowing from the nightclub. It was the sound of wisdom and pain, suffering and loss, lust and love and epitomized the deepest spiritual strength that lay beneath the surface of the character of the men and women who survived to create this music.
The humidity was a formidable force to some, but to the Bokor, it only served to remind him of the home of his birth in Africa and the Caribbean island he had been take to later as a slave. He paused to light a cigarette in the warm night air reflexively touching the amulet he wore around his neck. And although it was well past midnight, for the Bokor, the evening was just beginning. As spellbound as he was by the harrowing beauty of the music, there was much to be done. there was a ceremony to be performed and an elaborate one at that. The pouch that hung at his side contained herbs that had taken him weeks to locate once he had arrive on Louisiana soil.
There were others here like himself, bound by the singular continuity that only mutual suffering creates, these people found each other and in the process, began to find themselves. They were men and women from all over West Africa and the Caribbean. They met in secret, sharing their grief and fear and their hopes and dreams and a belief in a common mythology. Here Fela was a respected man. He was a man to be feared and above all, a man not to be crossed. Here the people were under the protection of and guidance of the Bokor. For The Bokor, the role he played gave him more than a sense of purpose. It gave him balance, poise and a confidence that he could never have achieved any other way.
Leaving the French Quarter, he headed for a particular cemetery he knew was not far from there. As he quickened his pace, a cool wind begin to blow, bringing with it the fragrant scent of moist bark. Suddenly, he felt the presence of the Loa around him. He prayed for guidance and protection. He appealed to Papa Legba to open the way, to remove all obstacles in his path, and for Ogun to guard him from his enemies. He had no idea how long he had been walking, for time, to the Bokor had ceased to exist, so it was no surprise to him when he suddenly found himself at the entrance to the cemetery. Passing through the gates, he paused. Looking through the trees at the Louisiana sky, he wondered if Oloddumare himself, in one grand cosmic gesture, had not flung a handful of jewels across the heavens. He continued on past the burial plots of aristocrats and beggars alike, the disparity they had known in life now transcended by the common bond of the grave, an irony not lost on the Bokor. A fog had followed the Bokor into the graveyard covering the crypts in a pale gray curtain that seemed to have neither a beginning nor an end.
The Bokor had not walked far when he found what he was looking for. The grave site of Antoine Boudroux was as inconspicuous as Boudroux had been notorious. Boudroux's keen instincts and fierce nature had been exceeded only by his predilection for cruelty. When face to face with a man of Boudroux's character, one is immediately confronted with the sad truth that a sense of humor, integrity and moral virtue are poor surrogates for the anger one feels that a man of such evil dimension is allowed by a seemingly arbitrary higher power to walk the earth here among us with all the cavalier gait of a man going to a nearby store to buy an evening paper. It was here at this dubious site that Fela paused. The graveyard dirt of a Bokor as powerful as Boudroux was strong juju indeed.
copyright 2014 by Kevin Casey Murphy
After A While I Heard The Rush Of Great Wings
I Mounted The Eagle
We Ascended Far Above The Mountain Clouds
There Was Freedom There
And Finally
Peace
The Gift Of The Bokor
He walked down the street, drawn as he always was by the music that flowed out of the nightclubs in the French Quarter. He stopped at "Homeboys" bowing his head in unconscious reverence at the haunting sound flowing from the nightclub. It was the sound of wisdom and pain, suffering and loss, lust and love and epitomized the deepest spiritual strength that lay beneath the surface of the character of the men and women who survived to create this music.
The humidity was a formidable force to some, but to the Bokor, it only served to remind him of the home of his birth in Africa and the Caribbean island he had been take to later as a slave. He paused to light a cigarette in the warm night air reflexively touching the amulet he wore around his neck. And although it was well past midnight, for the Bokor, the evening was just beginning. As spellbound as he was by the harrowing beauty of the music, there was much to be done. there was a ceremony to be performed and an elaborate one at that. The pouch that hung at his side contained herbs that had taken him weeks to locate once he had arrive on Louisiana soil.
There were others here like himself, bound by the singular continuity that only mutual suffering creates, these people found each other and in the process, began to find themselves. They were men and women from all over West Africa and the Caribbean. They met in secret, sharing their grief and fear and their hopes and dreams and a belief in a common mythology. Here Fela was a respected man. He was a man to be feared and above all, a man not to be crossed. Here the people were under the protection of and guidance of the Bokor. For The Bokor, the role he played gave him more than a sense of purpose. It gave him balance, poise and a confidence that he could never have achieved any other way.
Leaving the French Quarter, he headed for a particular cemetery he knew was not far from there. As he quickened his pace, a cool wind begin to blow, bringing with it the fragrant scent of moist bark. Suddenly, he felt the presence of the Loa around him. He prayed for guidance and protection. He appealed to Papa Legba to open the way, to remove all obstacles in his path, and for Ogun to guard him from his enemies. He had no idea how long he had been walking, for time, to the Bokor had ceased to exist, so it was no surprise to him when he suddenly found himself at the entrance to the cemetery. Passing through the gates, he paused. Looking through the trees at the Louisiana sky, he wondered if Oloddumare himself, in one grand cosmic gesture, had not flung a handful of jewels across the heavens. He continued on past the burial plots of aristocrats and beggars alike, the disparity they had known in life now transcended by the common bond of the grave, an irony not lost on the Bokor. A fog had followed the Bokor into the graveyard covering the crypts in a pale gray curtain that seemed to have neither a beginning nor an end.
The Bokor had not walked far when he found what he was looking for. The grave site of Antoine Boudroux was as inconspicuous as Boudroux had been notorious. Boudroux's keen instincts and fierce nature had been exceeded only by his predilection for cruelty. When face to face with a man of Boudroux's character, one is immediately confronted with the sad truth that a sense of humor, integrity and moral virtue are poor surrogates for the anger one feels that a man of such evil dimension is allowed by a seemingly arbitrary higher power to walk the earth here among us with all the cavalier gait of a man going to a nearby store to buy an evening paper. It was here at this dubious site that Fela paused. The graveyard dirt of a Bokor as powerful as Boudroux was strong juju indeed.
copyright 2014 by Kevin Casey Murphy
