#fetegede

~J.A. Mitchell

Last week in October as I touch down on Holy Ground

From the rarefied O-zone of tinged clouds up on high

In Port au Prince, sunlight turns when setting

amethyst magenta and mulberry

No dried leaves fall from these trees just thieves

Searching for gold in a dusty trench

of garbage and stench

I won't think twice about spending the night

Locked up like a rat in some hole of hell

Nope, we head for the sea and Jacmel

  The dark of the peristyle is plum and orchid

Cobalt blue shade when I arrive

The smell of heliotrope and scented soap

in my mama kanzo's dark  braided hair

is fresh like rain

  scraps of cloth on sewing room floor

Manman Brijit's layered skirts

are a swirl of satin a black and violet horizon

an evening gown trimmed in yards of purple lace

it fits tight about my waist where tiny white pearls

are sewn in place designs laid out for the Lwa

  Hanging on the outside of the peristyle door

a black satin Top hat now flat

The Baron's Crown symbol of royalty in the

necropolitian hierarchy of Dead Town

  White powder on the altar is for my face

Guede's (Sorry i meant to say

*Mister Guede healing hands- -

drink rum all night -sleep all day's)

favorite shirt folded on the altar

dark like Grape Koolaid

clinging to it, the musty smell of  wet sage

Candles in the dark begin a parade

Asons softly shake as voices raise

The prayer Ginea is made

Food is presented upon the Bawon's

and Gran Brijit's grave

  When the Banda rhythms are played on Petwo drums

first you stagger and stumble as rigor mortis is reversed

Then the body is oiled, and the tongue speaks prophetic verse

This is our  ancestor’s celebration.  Cover the mirrors

sorrow is on a well deserved vacation

  ©2001-2015. J.A. Mitchell. All rights reserved

  Glossary

Fete Gede- the celebration of the Collective Dead, that takes place in Haiti beginning on around All Hallows Day – All Soul's Day November 1st and ending on  the last day of November.

Manman Brijit- eldest female grave in  cemetery and mother of the Haitian dead. Symbolic representation of the  maternal line.

Bawon Simitye- eldest male grave in a cemetery.

Bawon Samedi - Symbolic of the paternal line. Administrator of the Haitian Afterlife.

Papa Gede- represents the African root of a lineage sent into slavery from the Abomey Plateau by the Fon.

Ason- beaded calabash symbolic of the power of the Houngan or Manbo in the South of Haiti .

Prayer Ginea- opening invocation of a Vodou ceremony started in French with the Saints, moving into Kreyol  that ends in a mixture of African language which calls the Lwa.