Smoke Straight from the Cachimbo
How it moves through me
The magic of this island is astounding!
I can feel the part of me that wants to smoke tobacco straight from a cachimbo (smoking pipe), drink freshly brewed coffee or mamajuana.
My tongue swells with desire for the medicine of this island in whatever way she expresses.
It moves.
It licks.
It salivates.
Dripping all over my mouth.
Like a vampire who sees the neck of its prey and just wants to suck on it.
As if human blood was the best thing this planet has to offer.
Gulping down her medicine with so much desire!
Swallowing it.
I can hear the slurping, the gushing.
Blood.
Mamajuana.
Red.
Same thing.
The blood of Christ.
The blood that runs through my veins.
The Church.
Eucharist. The Holy Grail.
I bow to receive you.
I vow to drink from thy well.
To taste the sweetness.
I want it.
Even without the purity.
That’s the darker side of me; the one I embrace.
That's the one who sits below the saint.
As above, so below.
There is magic on this island.
La musica.
La fiesta.
La naturaleza.
The chickens.
The roosters.
The cows.
The two wild pigs that are running around everyone’s land regardless of anyone’s barbed wire fences.
Eating everything on its path.
Full of mud.
Dirty. Gritty.
Their natural color is pink, but you wouldn’t be able to tell.
I hear them at random hours throughout the day and night.
They are as free as the wind that travels from tree to tree.
The wind that bounces off each branch weaving a beautiful song.
I can hear it coming from all directions.
West.
East.
North.
South.
From above me and below me.
Grazing the floor underneath.
Grazing the bottom of my feet.
Seeping into the microscopic space inside the soil.
The wind.
She's the bearer of messages from afar.
She brings messages from all around.
She speaks to me.
She speaks the language of sensation and She is rich.
Abundant.
My mind doesn’t understand Her and it’s truly MADDENING!
I miss the pedestalizing days when I could put my grandmother and mother on a pedestal and believe that they had it all together. That they had all the answers. The times when my mámi was still just my mámi.
Now, it’s all about seeing the truth in its fullness.
The good with the bad.
The power with the responsibility.
I’m seeing the unfinished business of my ancestors and with a machete chopping new roads, splitting the tangled weeds that tie to each other in knots that would make you trip if you aren’t careful.
Feeling this road with my felt sense, with nothing but starlight and moon dust to guide me.
Grandma is gone now.
Foundations have crumbled. And as I rebuild my own, I find that the tapestry of this island is embedded in my blood.
Sweet childlike innocence fleeting as I embrace the woman I’ve become.
The woman that I am.
There is magic on this island.
Every moment can be if I will for it to be so.
And She is so magical that even when I don’t will it, She doesn’t cease to exist.
She exists regardless.
And She creeps into the subconscious and shadows of most people here.
Many people have lost their way in the shadow realm. With shame and distraction that has tainted the natural liveliness and zest that exists here.
This was Christopher Columbus’ first stop on his voyage, and he robbed this island of many things, but he did not rob Her spirit.
She still lives here.
On both sides of the island. Haiti and the Dominican Republic.
La Hispaniola.
Quisqueya la bella.
The Tainos called Her Quisqueya which means “mother of all lands.”
And I can see why they did.
She lives here regardless if you believe.
I can feel Her beneath in the soil.
In the earth of our floors.
I can feel Her in the roots and veins of every leaf, root, and stem.
There's another world here.
It’s a magical world and plants are with the vibe.
The firewood married with the smoky wind.
The wind married with the moisture drops.
The river water married with wind-filled ripples, as the curvature of the earth holds and creates a path for her.
The ebb and flow of the ocean married to the magnetism of the moon.
The magnetic connection that holds this whole planet together and I find Her heart beating in my chest.
We are here.
Held.
In between the place where levitation meets gravity.
In the place between lightness and heaviness.
The place between it all.
In between the air and the earth, the water, the ocean, the river, the heat, the smoke.
All of it.
Magic.
Magic.
Magic all around.
And with my hands, I can swim in it.
With my feet, I can walk in it and with it.
With my head, I can perceive it,
With my body, I can feel it.
There is magic on this island.
And I don’t know what to do with it other than to sit with it.
The dead are here.
The souls of those past.
They all look at me.
Unfinished business abounds.
Sorrow.
Pain.
Suffering.
Here, on this land.
In loving memory of Doña Juana Estevez & Pavel Martinez. Peace and love for the souls of my ancestors. May your soul rest in peace. Descansen en paz.
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