#greengriots

If you were to ask tomorrow’s farmers, they would all agree that  the White Ahaw is no myth but a very real entity.  They would say it comes in the form of a thick cloud, sagging with unwanted remorse only to burst one time on  dry black soil until the seeds dead of overdose.

Ask  the indoor field workers and they would all profess, that the White Ahaw is not a thing of legend, but a breathing and living mess.  They would say that it is like the frenzied pangs of torrential winds, forcefully licking through window panes and  door panels. Pure licks on any type of structure, on any type of history as it bawl-out  ‘Progress! Progress!’

Ask the Mystic Man Dem on Fielding Avenue and they will all attest, that to them the White Ahaw is no new-age theory but an ancient bona fide danger.  It is like bad inside-outside smoke, the kind that clings to your lungs  and muffles your voice, hiding the road to your own terms.

But see you now, looking for the White Ahaw..have you not been warned? Do you believe that you can invoke this creature and expect not to be scorned? You cannot eat its meat nor will it  work your land and it will grin as it teef  resources from your hand, what business do you have feeding this beast, child?  For the sake of tomorrow`s farmers, of the inside fieldworkers, of the mystic  man dem who will always watch over your children, kill it and leave it there on the side of the road to rot in a pool of its own self-righteous promises.

And what if I were to die here, in the belly of Lost Lake, my bloated black body made heavy by failed lungs and irony.  All because of this fool.  This fool that I sadly and desperately depend on.  He knows it too, just like he intimately knows nautical knots and executive handshakes.  He knows how to roll a reefer better than I do and casually swallows drawn out tokes, controlling the release of both fumes and joints from his stalky fingers.  I accept and inhale..and cough.

‘ Northern Thunder, eh?  Good shit right?

  I nod, swallowing an earthy mix of swamp and pride.  We grab our paddles again and venture even farther into the lake, waves from our canoe announcing our presence to the dark world below.  A world of blues and greens and purples and blacks and life and sex and resistance and submission.  I remove my paddle and watch eddies succumb to a liquid eventuality and I feel real fucking blessed.  I see the clouds below full of droplets promising a safe return home.  I see rivers and migration patterns, refined by rocks and blockades, some natural, some man-made. I watch ripples from the Baptist`s  wet hands raising chance from defeat mixed with the everyday cleanin’ and bakin` after Sunday service.  Church.