This post is open for all to read. But, writing is my creative expression and I would so love your support. If you got something out of this, drop me a note or consider upgrading (basically, buying me lunch). This is the best way you can support my endeavours, and I greatly appreciate it!It’s finally snowing in Montana. It’s been 50 degrees up until just yesterday. The Yellowstone’s still unfrozen. The creek by the house keeps freezing and thawing. I heard someone’s garden started to sprout. I guess Montana doesn’t know what it wants this winter.
Orishas
The Orishas are the primary archetypes of the African diaspora. The dieties. The African diaspora, which originated in West and Central Africa, reaches all the places where descendants were exported to, primarily for slavery.
But what’s interesting is that much of African spirituality didn’t reach the cultures of the places to which they were brought. Or maybe it did, and white people like me, even generations later, don’t get to see it. But today, African spirituality is largely unknown to mainstream culture.
My family was never slave holders. They’re Sicilians. They came to the United States either to expand the mafia or to escape it. It depends on which side of the family you ask.
But, most of them were just incredibly poor. They didn’t eat meat for 15 years until they landed in New York City. My family actually visited the town they’re from, Santa Ninfa, last January—exactly a year ago.
Reflecting on the Orishas, the deities of West Africa, reminds me of the places I come. The things my ancestors carried with them. The things they left. The stories that survived and are with me today.
When we visited the town, the entire thing was painted with murals of emigration stories. Walls of letters from loved ones. Postcard images and stamps. Lady Liberty on the underpass of the bridge in the central strip. You could feel how important the emigration story was to that town, the Sicilians' journey to New York City.
Today, Santa Ninfa is a town of no more than 200 people. At one point, it was a town of all Spinas. Though I’m not sure how many are still there. I’m not sure how many might still be trying to get their last nonna on the boat.
And that’s a context for my reading of the Orishas.
That my ancestors were able and chose to leave their homeland, freely. They chose to come to this country for a better life and better opportunities. This is the story that still weaves the fabric of my family and of our collective identity.
And with them, they did bring their spirituality. Their Roman Catholic faith. Their culture of song, and family, and food, and a lot of Italian yelling.
And many of us know those stories. They’ve shaped American culture uniquely. There’s an Italian restaurant in every major city, and Italians have shaped culture throughout the United States.
But our African brothers and sisters, who were part of the Transatlantic Slave Trade, had a much more harrowing life, defined by war and conquest, deceit, forced labor, and removal from a homeland. There are stories of family members selling each other off for weapons: either trade or become a slave yourself.
And I’m thinking about this as I read about the Orishas.
Because I think as a person of European descent, you have to. You must becuase it softens you. Because it brings the context of the past forward. To remember in your bones war and conflict, and what pieces are still left that separate us from the heart.
The archetypes of the African diaspora describe and tell us a kind of spirituality based on myth. And not myth like “made up” but myth like Greek myths. The tales of gods and goddesses who created everything, and why and how.
And I’m touched by them.
For how similar they are to other tales, yet how hard it is for them to even survive.
It is the first time I have ever heard them, and not the first time I have ever known about the slave trade. I never questioned before what spirituality they might have been holding.
And I’m both surprised and not surprised that it was never taught.
Because our spirituality, the things we hold sacred, humanize us. They soften us. The lullabies of the Orishas are gentle and beautiful, like a story you tell your baby before they go down.
Calabash of Cowries
And so I’ll just share one with you today. Retold by Luisah Teish in her novel A Calabash of Cowries: Ancient Wisdom for Modern Times, which is my source of knowledge and story for the Orishas:
This is: The Day Her Belly Burst
“Once upon a time there was a beautiful woman by the name of Yemaya. She looked into the waters of the ocean, and there She saw Her own reflection, and She said, ‘Who is that beautiful woman? I thought that I was the most wonderful thing that the world had ever seen!’
And as She looked upon that woman, there came a rumbling in Her belly, and it grew, and it grew, and it grew till it exploded and sprinkled the night with stars and a full moon.
Yemaya looked into the light of the moon, and there She saw Her own reflection, and She asked, ‘Who is that beautiful woman? I thought that I was the prettiest thing that the world had ever seen!’
And as She looked upon that woman, there came a rumbling in Her belly, and it grew, and it grew, and it grew till it exploded and covered the earth with rivers, lakes, and streams.
Yemaya looked into the waters of the lake, and there She saw Her own reflection, and She cried, ‘Who is that beautiful woman? I thought that I was the finest thing that the world had ever seen!’
And as She looked upon that woman, there came a rumbling in Her belly, and it grew, and it grew, and it grew till it exploded, and before Her stood thousands of beautiful women!
‘Who are you, beautiful women?’ She exclaimed. ‘I thought that I was the loveliest thing that the world had ever seen!’
And the women looked deep into the eyes of Yemaya, and there they saw their own reflections, and they said to Her: ‘You are, Momma. We are just You.’”
Love,
Val
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